Controversial opinions

Yea, and are you ready for a health care system that runs as well as the Veterans’ Administration hospitals? You might have to wait months and months to get an appointment. If the bureaucrats are messing up, the only agency that can go after them is Congress. There will be no market forces to make them to do better. Nope. It will just be the government checking up on itself.

But after reading you many posts about how you hate old people and how you think that the fat, stupid people who have “made bad life choices” should be treated, that system will PERFECT for you.

Let the suckers die! That’ll show ‘em! Ebenezer Scrooge was right. Get rid of the excess population! Get rid of all of the old and fat people ... and that goes double for Trump supporters. They are all too stupid to live anyway. Am I right? Dig a hole and put ‘em in it!

Yea, I can see were poorly run, inefficient, poorly run, dishonestly reported socialized medicine will fit perfectly into your temp plate. After all, as vegan you will be perfectly healthy forever and never need any medical attention. And you won’t get old either.

Yep, government run health care is perfect for you.

 

Go easy on him JH . . . all he's got between the ears is tofu.

 

That's already happening constantly under our current system. It seems like all your complaints about what would happen under the addition of a few policies borrowed from socialism are already happening at high levels under capitalism. Maybe we both have the same end goal here.

We already have wealth concentrated at the top.

We already have political favors and bills passed for corporate interest groups.

We already have "death panels" see doctor's choosing to let patients unlikely to recover from covid die at home to treat more likely to make it patients in Texas in July.

In the beginning of covid, we even had bread lines. The only difference was, when you got to the front of our bread lines, you still had to pay for it.

 

It's absolutely not the same thing.

What you are complaining about has everything to do with the susceptibility of the politicians in our free market system to the influence of the lobbyists. Over hundreds of years we have permitted the concentration of power to the point that Washington insiders have all of the politicians in their pockets. If the Lobby didn't exist, or at least if it was substantially less influential, almost all of the problems of which you speak would cease in our capitalist system. There is a way to correct this, but such an effort would be met with extreme opposition by those in power. Only if supported by the people in a popular movement would such a reversal succeed.

In a socialist system, there is no way to dilute the concentration of power. It is part and parcel of the central planning that almost invariably attends socialist forms of government.

 

Well, you're right on that, and we're trying (with extreme opposition).

Taking this chance to reiterate I'm not suggesting we become a socialist state, merely adopt some policies of social democracies as we have in the past.

 

At least she has some clothes on in this shot. I wonder if that made her uncomfortable?

 

Cute, but not well-received.

By the way, my jab at lobbyists is not confined to those which influence Congress on behalf of industrialists . . . no, the same problems exist with the NRA, Planned Parenthood, BCBS, National Association of Broadcasters, Amazon, The Internet and Television Association, etc. They all need to be taken out at the knees.

And we're standing in the way of introducing more such policies, while hoping to rein in those that have failed already.

 

Are you familiar with the Nordic model? That's where I'd like to see this country trend towards.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_model

 

From the link you provided . . .

" . . . Since the 1980s and especially since the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Communist movement,[4] the influence of organised labor has decreased, collective bargaining schemes rolled back, along with reductions in social spending, deregulation and an expansion of privatisation of public services . . . "

Sounds to me like their system is gradually unraveling . . . likely a sign that it was unsustainable.

 

Nobody is perfect. Cutbacks to their system is still better than what we currently have.

 

You say that as if you know they will still have the same system well into the future, but you don't know that.

A system of government on which its people do not depend is far more sustainable than one on which they do.

 

Then has our system gone too far by making corporations only as profitable as they are by making them dependent on tax cuts, subsidies, once a decade bailouts?

Friendly reminder, for legal purposes we do consider corporations to be immortal persons.

 

You was ready for me!

 

the GOP was all upset about a Clinton BJ, but they excuse Trump having sex with porn stars while his wife is pregnant.

 

you're the one who wants to take away their Social Security, bud

 

Putting words in my mouth now? I have already stated that I don’t agree with Trump’s call to end the payroll tax.

Unlike you, I am not a political puppet who follows ever aspect of my preferred party’s line.

 

Should we end the socialism referred to as social security and medicare?

 

have some more bacon.

"Recent research suggests that Alzheimer's disease, like heart disease and strokes, is linked to the saturated fat, cholesterol, and toxins found in meat and dairy products. Studies have shown that people who eat meat and dairy products have a greater risk of developing Alzheimer's disease than do vegetarians."

 

Our corporations are not dependents . . . They are benefactors. There are far more corporations in the US than the few you would cite as benefitting from government.

Corporations do not depend on tax breaks . . . Politicians depend on excessive taxes to backfill their waste and unwarranted promises.

Subsidies do exist, but they are limited in number and their purpose is to insulate America against a resource disadvantage in the event of conflict. Thus, subsidies to the agriculture and fuel industries, which I agree with. I believe some other subsidies may exist, and I would likely be opposed to those.

With few exceptions, I oppose government bailouts of businesses / institutions. If viable competitors are standing in the wings, prepared to absorb the business and the resources, then the defaulting party should be left to go under and liquidate. When general malaise affects all parties in an industry, and there is no healthy competitor to carry on, intervention is necessary to prevent the entire industry from collapsing. The airline industry is a fine example. Independence Air went bankrupt in 2009, as it should have. Northwest airlines bought its assets and made a go of it. This year, due to COVID-19, all airlines are distressed across the board. There are no healthy airlines, and the industry needs saving, so a bailout is in order.

Our free market system does not encourage the dependency of corporations. The socialist model you referenced does encourage dependency of its citizens.

 

I'd argue it does encourage their dependency primarily via bailout. Every major corporation was supposedly going broke a week or so into the shutdown this year. They got massive bailouts. This isn't new, they know if something big and unforeseen happens (like covid) they won't have to take care if it themselves, the government has an informal safety net for them, and we pay for it because they sure aren't paying their share of taxes. They don't plan for the unforeseen because they don't have to.

Meanwhile, this pandemic will serve to solidify their market share as their smaller business competitors are allowed to go under.