"I reject it, completely. And I don't like anyone winking and nodding at the right wing nutters while they are running to head up the Democratic ticket."
So who WOULD you vote for? Hillary was triangulating all the way to Iowa, and then she took a break for a week.
You're going too far with these remarks. They are factually correct. I loathe just about every aspect of Reagan's legacy, but it is impossible to deny 2 elections years where the electoral map was solid red. Government WAS broken in the '70's, and it WAS bloated. IT STILL IS. It's even worse now under Bush, because of Cheney et al.'s idiocy that "deficit spending doesn't matter."
I agree with liberalism more than any other political philosophy, but it cannot be impractical. I cheered when Clinton said "we need a smaller, smarter government." The bureacracy is bloated, and always has been. Gore made great progress with his 5-year "reinventing government" project, but Bush abandoned it.
Our differences on this mirror our discussion regarding universal healthcare. We both agree philisophically that this should be a priority in America. I don't want to see it done until someone has a plan that can reasonably pay for most of it, without affecting taxes and without creating another runaway gov't program that we can't control. You stated that we just need to agitate for it, and in effect, damn the torpedoes & whatever fiscal issues may arise as a result.
I'm not down with that. My biggest problem with the left-wing of the party I tend to vote for is that they are so eager & often desperate to implement the plans they believe in (and that is understandable, given the usual political climate, which constrains such change), that they are generally very irresponsible fiscally, and even tend to disparage those who are.
No, I am not disparaging you, I am only reconizing that there is that gulf there...you are a fiscal conservative, I am not.
My opinion is, that if we wait until it would be financially responsible to implement things like universal health care, that time will never come. When do you think the historic bush deficits are going to be paid off Onceler? Do you think it's an accident that they are that high? Because I don't. I think that's the plan. Let's bankrupt the government so that liberals can't institute new social programs, and in fact, so that we are foriced to cut back on existing ones. This kills people, it costs lives.
So I push back by saying, no, I won't go along with that plan, in order to be termed "fiscally responsible". Instead I say go for broke, and then when something finally has to be slashed, let's have a political fight to the death over whether it's going to be social programs or the military budget, and overseas tax shelters, and the estate tax, etc.
I think I know where the American people are going to comee down on that, and I'm not afraid of that fight. I want that fight.
The only alternative to having that fight is to cave into the right wing strategy of allowing them to bankrupt us, and electing DLC dems in response, as the situation gets worse and worse and worse, until finally, when the left in this country truly has no voice, and something does have to be cut, they will swing this country right back to Pre-New Deal America, their ultimate, and stated goal.
And people will die.
