Free Republic

This birther stuff is crazy. You do know how wacko that makes Republicans look to Americans? I read that the State of Hawaii sent to the Judge a certified copy of the long form birth certificate. Case thrown out, like others.

He’s a natural born citizen, according to the laws of our nation, that we all follow. He’s the President. Move on to defeat him in the fall (pun intended). This argument is nowheresville and makes the people who say it look out of touch with reality.

What a shocker! A group of men being critical of a woman’s appearance! Vacation criticism, like those of all First Ladies (Laura Bush took plenty of vacations) is legit. Criticism of their appearance is not legit and is sexist. I saw posts about Laura’s thick ankles and shapeless legs, and that being why she wore pants so often. I saw posts years ago criticizing her for not wearing dresses more often. I saw posts criticizing her hair, her supposedly squinty eyes, her matronly fashion style, etc., etc. All out of bounds, IMO. They didn’t run for office and are not Presidents. They’re just married to the guy and do their best to dress appropriately, have the required pet projects, and continue to raise their children and keep their marriages intact.

In a way this makes sense. When you’re talking about writing legislation to require something, you don’t need to talk to groups that oppose it. They won’t have anything to offer about how to write the legislation. They simply oppose it. But if you want guidane in how to word the legislation, you would speak with people or groups are knowledgeable about how the service/drug is used, to make sure you worded it right. I don’t know if Planned Parenthood would be the group I’d go to. I’d probably choose a few OBGYN doctors. I don’t know what NARAL is.

You know, at first I was totally opposed to the contraception thing - on the grounds of cost, not religion. I also didn’t like forcing the insurers for Cath. hospitals to provide it, for ethical and moral reasons. But after I’ve read up on it, I understand it more. I still don’t like the cost aspect. It’s an elective drug and usu. not taken for medical reasons. And the cost will be HUGE. But for Catholic institutions, if you’re going to go into business and accept funds from teh govt., you do have to abide by the laws. Contraception is legal, is being required to be covered by ins., so it’s a lot like the labor laws, worker safety laws, and the like. Those same ins. cos. cover vasectomies, even when used for contraception, and viagra, which is very much an elective drug and costly to us all.

Personally, I think it crosses the line to question someone else’s spiritual beliefs. None of us can know what’s in the heart of someone else. It’s off base to question Santorum’s or Romney’s or Bush’s or anyone else’s Christian values, IMO. And it doesn’t help the economy, either.

If I recall correctly, that was a Bush initiative. It’s something the health care providers AND insurance companies have been pushing for years. Ins. cos. want health records online so they can pour over them and find ancient records of someone & use them to deny coverage (a statement someone made to a dr., say, 20 years ago).

I don’t like it. I think it’s horrible. Imagine if you are a young guy and get an STD. That information will follow you to the grave. All your care providers and ins. cos. from that time until your death will know about it. And then there’s the danger of hackers. You KNOW it’ll be hacked, sooner or later.

But since the insurance cos. seem to eventually get what they want, and since both Republicans and Democrat political leaders have been paid to “want” it, too...I think this will happen. It won’t be the fed, per se, that has the database. It’s supposed to be some interconnected system of health care records or something.

Savings is at a high point in our country, and companies are rolling in cash. That’s not the problem.

I posted before the deficit deal...whatever it was going to be...that this didn’t bode well for the economy. All the economists I saw on TV said so. The rule is: You don’t cut spending in a recession or a light recovery from a recession; it hurts the economy and is likely to catapult the country into a recession or deeper recession. (Talking about not increasing revenues at the same time, I think they were; if you increase revenues simultaneously, then I think they were saying you could do some cuts.)

I looked at the stock market today. It’s very upsetting. My 401K will be hit hard, as will yours. Because of the debt deal.

I think we oughtta vote all the a__holes out of Congress and get a whole new bunch, if this is the best they can do. A modest revenue increase on the richest Americans (or at least do away with tax loopholes for corporations like Exxon, THAT PAID ZERO TAXES LAST YEAR DESPITE RECORD PROFITS...one of the largest companies in the world), with modest cuts. You can’t fix in one swoop what has taken a decade to occur. Esp. not in a recession or slight recovery from a deep recession.

Now a lot of government workers may be laid off. There are no jobs out here in the private sector for them. They won’t be spending money on appliances, cars, etc. That will hurt the economy. Some may be foreclosed on. That will hurt the economy. And we’ll suffer at not having services. We already have crumbling bridges, levees that don’t stop flood waters, etc. They can do with becoming more efficient, that’s for sure. But layoffs at this time is horrible. Worse than an increasing deficit. Not that the deficit isn’t a big problem. It is. But we have a bigger problem right now.

We can’t decrease the deficit, really, if the economy stays bad. Fewer workers = fewer revenues = less $ to pay off debt. It’s pretty simple.

I heard someone on TV today say they thought the tea partiers in Congress intentionally wanted the economy to tank, thinking that it would hurt Obama’s chance at re-election. I hope that’s not true. That they care more about that than millions of Americans who relied on them to do their best for America and its millions of citizens. I’ve worked hard for decades and contributed to my 401K, doing without vacations and luxuries. Today I saw a good chunk of it go down the drain because of the debt deal. It does absolutely nothing to help the economy or jobs situation. Nothing. And worse. It hurts the economy.

Just calling out....please re-read my prior posts. You won’t find any juvenile name calling and tone of hatred.

That’d be only in your and other posts.

If you want to be taken seriously, you gotta act (and talk) like a grownup. (Your mama wears army boots! doesn’t cut it over the age of 8.)

That’s wrong. If we default on our loans, it’ll cost us MORE than if paid them. Just like if you don’t pay your credit cards...that doesn’t mean you don’t still owe it, and that it won’t cost you MORE down the line. There would be late fees, they’d raise your interest rate a lot immediately, and ultimately, you’d be sued for the $$$. That’s because legally you owe it, it’s money that belongs to someone else, and they will get it back, with interest and fees, in the end.

That’s what would happen. And ALSO, we wouldn’t be able to borrow more money at reasonable interest rates. I know you say we don’t need it. But what if we did? Another BP spill? Another Katrina or Rita? A nuclear meltdown?

So it feels good up front not to pay our bills when they come due, but in the end, it ends us costing us more. We wouldn’t recover the huge expense of failing to pay our bills, for many years to come.

And of course don’t forget that some of the bills we owe are to veterans and elderly people. They live month to month on their disability or whatever. They would suffer a lot if we failed to pay them. I wouldn’t want to see that. I would hope the govt would not pay something else before it would cause suffering to our heroes, our disabled, and our elderly.

This sounds okay to me. It’s a small state, so they can do things that larger ones can’t. And part of its state resources are its natural beauty and resort areas and skiing and whatnot, so they have a larger stake in keeping their state environmentally sound and healthy.

I’m remembering decades ago when “greenies” were warning about the release of mercury in oceans and waterways and the harm it could cause. Others decried that as false panic, lies, etc. Fast forward decades: The mercury has in fact caused harm; pregnant women are not supposed to eat fish, and other people are supposed to limit tuna and other kinds of fish to twice a week or something....because the fish are poisoned with mercury.

Mercury’s very dangerous, it seems.

I use both incandescent and CFLs in my house. But I just throw them both away when they burn out. I didn’t know I was supposed to do anything special with them. I mean, what could I do with them? Drive miles away to dispose of one light bulb?

I agree. It is a GOOD thing for children to learn foreign languages, as many as possible. I don’t speak any foreign language fluently; I wish that had been offered in my elementary school (they didn’t do that, back in those days). And Chinese is very difficult. I’m impressed.

Chow. Au revoir. (that’s about the extent of my foreign language expertise.)

Well, since McCain lost with Palin on the ticket...how are things working out for you so far? Better than a McCain-Romney administration?

Actually, no, they didn’t. Margaret Thatcher was well educated, politically savvy, hard as nails, serious, well spoken, and extremely knowledgeable. No, no one said she couldn’t handle the job.

It turned out that Noonan was right about Palin. Or at least most Americans agreed with her, including me. Altho Palin generated some excitement at the beginning, she doomed the Republicans to losing, once she opened her mouth. She clearly wasn’t VP material, or anywhere close. She’s a nice gal. She’d be great as a small town mayor. But she’s not knowledgeable or focused enough to lead a country, by a long shot. No one with a brain voted for that ticket, once she was put on it. McCain might’ve lost, anyway, but he’d have had a shot if he’d named a serious VP who could’ve been President, if necessary (like Romney, just to pick a name...Romney, incidentally, would’ve won the ticket for the Republicans, I believe, because as it turns out...the economy became the big issue, and that was Romney’s strong point).

So you can criticize Noonan, but she was merely reflecting what most people in the country were thinking. She wasn’t attacking. She was stating the obvious. She didn’t call her names or make fun of her. She was respectful, but honest.

Palin will never be in the White House. I’m baffled by the group that seems to think she has the right stuff to do that sort of thing. She hasn’t even stayed a full term at anything, or solved a financial crisis, or resolved a serious problem. She quit as mayor. She quit as a councilwoman. She quit as governor. She’d be great with a talk show, though. That is her background.

Actually, hate speech is not protected by the First Amendment. By law. The Free Speech amendment doesn’t guarantee the right to say ANYTHING. You know the “Fire!” example.

Critical speech and hate speech are two different things, though. I don’t know if “homo” falls under the hate speech category. But I do know that I don’t want my leaders calling people names, whether it’s individuals or groups of people. It’s immature and silly and serves no leadership purpose. As for regular, non-leader people, I tend not to associate with people who call other groups derogatory names. Any other groups. I just don’t relate to that mindset.

I cherish the dream. In few countries would I have been able to achieve all that I’ve achieved on my own (not that it’s that much, but still...). I’ve worked hard all my adult life, and most of my teen years. No one’s given me anything. Well, anything to speak of. But....I think Nugent is revising history. It was with France’s help that we won our independence. We didn’t do it alone. Sure, France had its own reasons, but that’s beside the point. Did Nugent remember that, when France went against Bush in voting for the Iraq War? There was much talk about how France should rubber stamp our decisions because our troops had died saving France from Hitler. But France had troops who died on our soil, saving us from England. And our Statue of Liberty that we’re so proud of: a gift from France.

As for health care, I don’t want my taxes to increase to pay for the health care of freeloaders. No one does. But something has to be done. Bush’s administration had 8 years to do something, but all they did was pass the multi-trillion dollar Medicare Reform Act. I’m 55 years old. If I lost my job, who would insure me for a reasonable premium? I’m healthy. No problems at all. But I’m 55. Statistics are against me, in the profit-making world. How would I pay the high premiums? The cost of pharmaceuticals has risen hundreds of percent since the 1960s. The cost of seeing a doctor just for the flu is over $100. I don’t know what can be done. But something must be done.

About a bureaucrat interfering, and restrictions on my choices. What choices? My employer pays for my health care ins. It decides on the company, the coverage, and they give me a list of doctors I can go to, and there’s a list of procedures that will, and will not, be paid for. If I have a tumor removed, I must do it in an outpatient facility, and try to bribe, or pay, a friend to come pick me up, since they won’t let me leave the facility after being on anesthesia. Someone is making almost all the choices NOW about my health care. And it ain’t me. So what’s the difference?

The way I see it, since the Republicans didn’t seem to think there was a health care problem, and did nothing about it, the Democrats were voted in to do just that. I’m of a mind that something must be done, by someone. At this point, I’m not sure I care much WHO does something. As long as SOMETHING is done.

I’m no health care expert. But neither are most Americans. I don’t know what should be done, or what plan the Democrats will come up with, or if it will be good or bad. I just don’t know. But it’s like that funny line in the movie “Paint Your Wagon,” when the Mormon husband says to the 2nd of his two wives, who has just agreed to be sold to the dirty mining men, “But Wife! You don’t know what you’ll get!” She replies, “I may not know what I’ll get. But I know what I’ve had.”

He’s the only surviving member of the 320th Battalion. 40 others are getting medals, too. So it’s possible that all the troops in the previous waves have rec’d recognition medals already. That was a long time ago. There probably aren’t many of them alive anymore.

Why’d he wait and do this right before the election? Hmmmmm.

I mean, it sounds like a great idea. And if it was a great idea, why did he wait until the END of his presidency? He had years to do it before.

This isn’t the kind of churck I’d be interested in. Call me old fashioned, but I expect to find a place of calmness, love thy neighbor, and non-violence in a place of worship (which would also be filled with children and babies).

Guns don’t promote that sort of environment. If a person has a permit to carry, then carry it out of sight. But standing at the front in a line, exhibiting weapons of violence in a holy place? Nope. I wouldn’t be goin’ there to hear sermons about love, serving God, promoting a wholesome family life, etc.

Sounds like the employer has a beef with them for making it public that he wouldn’t insure the babes. The employer probably rec’d some pretty hateful emails and letters.

Is it just that one? I mean, to write an article about “lobbyists” and then name only one former lobbyist...that seems manipulative and deceptive, to me. The article, that is. (But I can’t click on the article to read it....I’ve stopped clicking on unknown links.)