Affordable Health Care Law under review by SCOTUS

[johnnya24]

It's pretty close to even. But even if, say, I was a 80% match with the Dems, an 85% match with the Greens, and a 10% match with the Republicans, I'd always vote for the choice between the Dem candidate and the Green candidate who has the best chance of defeating the Republican. The last thing I'd want to see is the votes of me and like-minded folks splitting in a way that benefits my least-favored candidate. It would not be remotely in my interest to promote something like that.

Problem with the Green's as a political party (everywhere not just the USA) is that once they start to gain political leverage, the main parties just steal their clothes and leave them with no unique platform.

This should be viewed as a good thing IMO. Ironically, being politically liquidated is probably the most the Green's can hope to achieve in a real political sense. It means their message is now mainstream. In Europe this happened in the 90's ... America is proving a much harder nut to crack.

In this sense a vote for the Green's is not a wasted vote ... because the more popularity they are seen to gain, the more likely their message will get absorbed into the mainstream and put closer to the center of the the both parties political manifestos. Right-wing climate change skepticism does have any medium or long term shelf-life (well I hope it doesn't have any medium term shelf life for all our sake).

[B-Fly]

In this sense a vote for the Green's is not a wasted vote ... because the more popularity they are seen to gain, the more likely their message will get absorbed into the mainstream and put closer to the center of the the both parties political manifestos. Right-wing climate change skepticism does have any medium or long term shelf-life (well I hope it doesn't have any medium term shelf life for all our sake).

In 2000, a vote for Green Party candidate Ralph Nader in Florida was a lot worse than a wasted vote. It was a gift-wrapped wet kiss to George W Bush. I've got no real problem with a protest-based or ideologically-based third party vote in an uncontested election or an uncontested state in a presidential election. I've got a huge problem with it in a closely-contested state or election.

[B-Fly]

I find this to be patently untrue.

The reason I believe it to be untrue is because while the Republicans are moving to the right, the Democrats are shifting right along with them. There are a couple social issues where this is not the case, but generally speaking "far left" candidates are pretty much nonexistent on a national level. The same cannot be said about far right candidates, obviously.

I'm interested to see if you could convince me otherwise but it appears to be a total falsehood to me to assert that primaries (or anything) compel Democratic candidates further left.

I'm laughing because johnny just posted that he viewed both parties (and the American populace) as trending left, whereas you view them as trending right, and I view them as both trending toward their bases. But as always, it's going to be issue-by-issue. It shouldn't surprise anyone that 9/11 resulted in a rightward trend for both parties on national security. However, the Dems have clearly shifted left on homosexual rights, health care and the environment. Other issues are up for debate. I think there's a shift within the Democratic Party toward what might be viewed as the right on education policy and certain other aspects around public employee labor unions, particularly at the City and State levels where Democrats find themselves as "management" in the binary management/labor relationship. Obama certainly seems to be left of where Clinton was on regulation of Wall Street and banks, but I'm sure that Obama hasn't moved as far left of Clinton as many Democrats would have liked. Again, we'd really have to delve deeply into the question issue by issue, but it's pretty remarkable that the question of the rightward or leftward shift of the average American voter and the rightward or leftward shift of either of the two major parties is a matter of considerable debate. And more often than not, the more ideologically pure the analyst, the more likely they are to see that tide as moving against them.

[B-Fly]

1 - Shifted left on health care? Uh, no way. The conversation used to be about universal health care. This abortion of a health care bill in the form of Obamacare is essentially what conservatives (in the form of the Heritage Foundation) put out as a response to Hilarycare. Totally false that they've shifted left on health care.

2 - Other issues are up for debate? Then debate them. How about gun control? Offshore drilling? Defense spending? Progressive taxation?


I think Democrats have been hoodwinked by the ol' single issue concept. Yes, Democrats actually come out in favor of gay marriage now. That's pretty much it. Laugh all you want but the facts don't support your assertions whatsoever.



Edit: Also pretty sure you've missed Johnny's point if you're asserting that he views both parties as trending left. I'll let him deal with that one on his own, though.

As with welfare reform under Clinton, Obamacare is a reflection of what could be achieved legislatively. To compare it against prior incohate health care plans or against position statements divorced from the actual legislative process doesn't tell us much. So I guess what I should have said is that the Democrats under Obama moved us to the left on health care, whereas past Democratic Administrations left us with the status quo. You feel that Obamacare is "an abortion of a health care bill"; I view it as the best option legislatively achievable to move us toward universal coverage. That's about tactics, not core principles.

As for Clinton Adminstration tax rates versus Obama Administration tax rates, do you think there's been a rightward shift in ideology? Or are we talking about two Democratic presidents, both essentially Keynesian, who aren't going to rush out tax hikes in a recession but will happily do so, particularly on the highest earners, during a recovery? Since the economic recovery began, the Obama Administration has been pushing for tax hikes on the wealthiest Americans and he's been blocked by a Republican House. If he introduces progressive tax hikes but can't get them through the House, is that evidence of a shift in party ideology? Is the fact that raising taxes wasn't pursued by the Obama Administration and the Democratic Congress during the Jan 2009-Jan 2011 period when they were trying to stimulate the economy out of a terrible recession evidence of a shift in ideology? I don't think so.

As for defense spending, do you really attribute Obama versus Clinton levels as the result of an ideological shift, as distinguished from the fact that Obama took office in a post-9/11 world while the United States was already engaged in two ongoing wars?

I will agree that the NRA has succeeded in making gun control a pretty toxic issue for Democrats at the federal level.

Again, viewed in context, I don't see Obama as ideologically to the right of Clinton. I see two guys with largely consistent ideologies, each of whom is trying to promote what they think is practical given the respective hands they're dealt.

[Mithrandir]

In 2000, a vote for Green Party candidate Ralph Nader in Florida was a lot worse than a wasted vote. It was a gift-wrapped wet kiss to George W Bush. I've got no real problem with a protest-based or ideologically-based third party vote in an uncontested election or an uncontested state in a presidential election. I've got a huge problem with it in a closely-contested state or election.

So you have a huge problem with my right to vote for anyone i choose? If i think neither Dem. or GOP is a worthwhile candidate I have to vote for one of them or you have a problem? Sorry B, but i gave you a problem the last 6 elections!

[B-Fly]

So you have a huge problem with my right to vote for anyone i choose? If i think neither Dem. or GOP is a worthwhile candidate I have to vote for one of them or you have a problem? Sorry B, but i gave you a problem the last 6 elections!

I don't deny your right to vote for anyone you choose. However, if you do have a significant preference between the two major party candidates and you're voting in a contested election, I have a big problem with the strategy of voting third-party. Hey, if you honestly view the Republican and the Democrat as essentially equally deficient, absolutely, vote for someone else.

[Mithrandir]

I don't deny your right to vote for anyone you choose. However, if you do have a significant preference between the two major party candidates and you're voting in a contested election, I have a big problem with the strategy of voting third-party. Hey, if you honestly view the Republican and the Democrat as essentially equally deficient, absolutely, vote for someone else.

yes i do view them as equally deficient.

[B-Fly]

yes i do view them as equally deficient.

Okay. I don't know where you stand issue by issue to quarrel with your assessment, then. For folks whose politics are clearly left-leaning, however, I think it's foolish to suggest that there is no material difference between the Democrats and the Republicans. And for them, I think a vote for a third-party candidate in a contested election is foolish.

[Mithrandir]

Okay. I don't know where you stand issue by issue to quarrel with your assessment, then. For folks whose politics are clearly left-leaning, however, I think it's foolish to suggest that there is no material difference between the Democrats and the Republicans. And for them, I think a vote for a third-party candidate in a contested election is foolish.

I never said there is no material difference between the two parties, i just don't think either party is really concerned with advancing America in a positive direction on many accounts.

[johnnya24]

That may be your take as an outside observer, but I'm not sure all that many Americans within the American political spectrum would agree with you. I think you've got right wing and left wing populists who think that both parties are too beholden to big business, but on deeply-felt moral issues, those groups find themselves at opposite ends of the spectrum. That's the Tea Party populists and the Occupy Wall Street populists. I think you've got a fair number of folks who also find themselves conservative on fiscal/economic/labor policy but liberal on social policies (e.g., Libertarians like senorsheep), and then a fair number of folks who find themselves liberal on fiscal/economic/labor policy but conservative on social policies (e.g., "Reagan Democrats" or blue collar union types or growing numbers of young evangelicals).

For those who find themselves left of the Democratic Party on all issues or right of the Republican Party on all issues, the current trend is already working. Primaries have been tending to compel Democratic candidates further left and Republican candidates further right. For those folks, the best bet would seem to keep doing what you're doing and watch your party become the left-wing or right-wing party you're craving.

I'm not sure if that's really what I'm saying. Obviously all shades of the spectrum exist in the populous. Same everywhere, but you will never get them all represented in a 2 party system, even if the parties have internal "strands". Of course the 2 party system isn't changing, so it's a purely academic debate. There has to be a degree of suppression in a 2 party system. Typically the extremities are appeased and shut up ... they are absorbed in order to create a larger demographic base ... and when it works well, the entire base can be mobilized for the one cause, the most important cause of any entitled political party ... re-election.

The GOP have let side issues fracture their base by too much pandering to fundamentalists during the Bush era. This was clearly tactical despite Bush's fundamentalist rhetoric. Cheney, Rumsfeld et al were hardcore pragmatists ... they really didn't give a rats ass about abortion and gay marriage ... appeasing the fundamentalists and making Christian issues central to the agenda was part of the drive to soften war weariness and create a "them and us" dialectic with the enemy. It worked. Here ... think about killing fetuses and gay homosex while we strip away your freedoms and start illegal wars.

The fact that post-Bush people on both sides still feel they should vote their conscience on "Christian" side issues like abortion and gay marriage is sad because (a) these have no business being part of any broad based political manifesto, and it's up to the electorate to realize this, and (b) they are non-issues in a liberal democracy once they have reached a tipping point. It's sad that despite the fact we are in the middle of the most serious economic meltdown in 30 years, these politically nonsense issues have been allowed to carry over and take center stage. Or is it just more distraction from the harsh reality that unregulated free market capitalism has failed miserably? ... neither side wants to bring that up ... Clinton deregulated the markets, and it's a point of almost religious fanaticism among many GOP members.

The Bush regime, the GOP and their media machine is clearly responsible for (a). (b) is where the core of the debate lies though for the individual, even if "your" party doesn't want to acknowledge it. America is a Liberal Democracy, and it's something that characterizes the nation at an almost ideological and personal level. If you accept the legal framework of liberal democracy, there are certain almost unstoppable tendencies, which once they become mainstream, cannot be reversed without destroying the very fabric of a liberal democracy. Women's rights, civil rights, abortion, gay rights etc etc. Once these issues reach a tipping point, they have to be absorbed or the system breaks into something that is not liberal democracy (and if you look at the Bush years those boundaries were exceeded on more than one occasion, especially when it comes to individual freedom ... a core non-partisan American ideal). Abortion reached that tipping point a long time ago. Gay marriage is in the eye of the storm, it's hard to see even the GOP wanting to be labeled as homophobic. This is a cross they will have to bare when the inevitable happens.

This is another reason why it is safe to say that the American political spectrum is moving slowly towards the left ... legal precedence and the inherent tendency towards a system that is more equal for everyone will always favor the solution that discriminates less. The GOP are having electoral issues because they are finding themselves standing in the path of the inevitable on too many issues ... issues which if they were clever, they would find a way to bracket off.

IMO people need to take responsibility and bracket off these issues when they come to vote. Because there fundamentally is no issue at a legal level ... unless these people want to dismantle the framework of liberal democracy and replace it with a kind of narrow oligarchy ... because that is what it comes down to. You simply cannot have equal rights for gays, and prohibit them from having the same civil protection as straight people (in the form of civil union). It's not possible within a "liberal democracy". Same with abortion ...

[baldgriff]

I dont find that the parties of majority are concerned with "The People". I know Ive said it before, but those 2 political machines are more about the business of politics, rather than a substantive change.

People can argue that all they want, but I just dont see anything really changing in the near future.


This economy is so screwed up and if people want to point to the market as a positive, well I dont expect it will stay where its at....

[johnnya24]

In 2000, a vote for Green Party candidate Ralph Nader in Florida was a lot worse than a wasted vote. It was a gift-wrapped wet kiss to George W Bush. I've got no real problem with a protest-based or ideologically-based third party vote in an uncontested election or an uncontested state in a presidential election. I've got a huge problem with it in a closely-contested state or election.

That's a bit disingenuous. I wouldn't expect you to reduce an entire issue to a single incident for the sake of an argument.

In a swing state, of course the tendency will and should be different. This is a different issue.

Also another example of the shift leftwards towards the center of the wider voting tendencies ... the GOP got so lucky to win despite losing the popular vote by more than half a million.

[Gregg]

I don't deny your right to vote for anyone you choose. However, if you do have a significant preference between the two major party candidates and you're voting in a contested election, I have a big problem with the strategy of voting third-party. Hey, if you honestly view the Republican and the Democrat as essentially equally deficient, absolutely, vote for someone else.

Nice to have you around.

Off work today?

[johnnya24]

- There are many other subjects that also show the Democratic move to the right that we haven't even touched on --- civil liberties, for example.
.

How much of this do you think was the Dem's trying to stay relevant and electable during the Bush years? Certain civil liberties issues were a strong part of Obama's first election platform ... of course not the major excesses of the Patriot Act and the Homeland Security Act ... but that would almost seem like electoral suicide given that it would open the door to the GOP of foreign policy.

I think it's a fair argument to say that party politics rather than a shift in principles is what has caused this apparent disregard for civil liberties.

[PaleoMan]

And so it begins. You have major carriers strategically leaving unfriendly marketplaces and ending their individual plans. 2014 is going to be a bloodbath when the premium readjustments are mailed out.

http://news.yahoo.com/aetna-exit-californias-individual-insurance-market-184916425.html

Aetna had informed California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones of its decision to exit the market, Coplin said, but it was still in the process of notifying members and brokers.

The move comes as California, the country's most populous state, prepares for the fall launch of a state health exchange authorized by President Barack Obama's Affordable Care Act.