Comments

1
Obamacare is dying regardless.
2
Innovation is the answer to everything . . . except "what's for dinner?" at which point a garden and some chickens acquire significant relevance. Thanks for the update on our potential dystopia, Lelani.
3
clever, giving (midterm voting) seniors double the credit of their juniors. as if seniors don't get enough - my trumpist dad has had 3 surgeries in the last year on the taxpayer's dime.
4
Terrifying. I don't understand why these politicians (or those who continue to vote for them) have such a disconnect. We will (almost) all suffer because of these cutbacks.
5
@4:

The problem is that, from the Conservative perspective there is no disconnect; this is truly how they view the world: as a place where everyone is on their own, collective effort and will is anathema, God's Law is the sole arbiter of moral conduct, the "invisible hand of the free market" is the primary driver for economic policy, and the accumulation of wealth (and the power it grants) is the only worthy goal of human aspiration.
6
@3: Three surgeries last year. My goodness, I hope he mends well. I trust he can still play, unless he has respiratory issues?
7
@6: sebaceous cyst, 2 carpal tunnels. he's fine. if there's any issue, he goes for surgery immediately. because he can afford it.
8
@6

I do not believe Trumpist is synonymous with trumpeter.
9
The Earth is dying regardless. The sun is going to die. The universe is dying, regardless. In the long run, we're all dead. None of that gets you off the hook for how you treat people today. None of that is a reason for people to let themselves be fucked.

I can't imagine those millions of people going back to the way it was. Millions of people getting primary care at the ER, the rest of us paying for it. The medical bankruptcies. Philosophically, that's the only system conservatives can believe in, but the country won't have it. I'm not saying I think the Republicans will have the sense to prevent it. They'll drive the country into a ditch, the same way they put us in a quagmire in Iraq or let the great recession happen. They didn't want to, but the dissonance among them makes them incapable of anything else.

After they fuck it up, either Obamacare or Medicare for all is coming back with a vengeance. Nobody has proposed any better scenario.
10
Life expectancy versus health care spending.
https://blogs-images.forbes.com/danmunro…
American exceptionalism at its finest.
12
The DNC committed suicide with it's election of Tom Perez as Chairperson this weekend. We can thank the Establishment wing of the party for Donald Trump's re-election in 2020.

The Establishment liberals have no where to go. They're Party loyalists, Yellow Dog Democrats who will support whoever their party nominates. That is not true for the Progressive wing of the Party. When the Establishment forced its neoliberal agenda, in the form of Hillary Clinton, into the nomination, they then told the Progressive wing in no uncertain terms that we were nt needed, and that Clinton was going to win the General Election without us.

Now, Establishment Democrats everywhere are howling at us like rabid yellow dogs, unable to comprehend why we did not vote Clinton. Many stayed home. A few voted Green or for some other, smaller party. Some voted in the downticket races, ignoring the Presidential candidates altogether.

There has been no introspection on the part of the Establishment ever since. Blame is externalized to everyone from the Russians, to Jill Stein, to Kshama Sawant, and to the media. Nobody is asking, "Where did we screw up? How can we do better next time?"

This is highlighted by Keith Ellison's narrow loss to Tom Perez. The Establishment has yet again demanded that the Progressives shall never have a voice in the Party. This alienation of the Democratic Left will absolutely lead to a hemorrhage of voters in 2018 and 2020. We may very well have to wait for the Establishment to die of old age before they left go of their death grip on the Party leadership. The Party will dwindle even further. The Unions and the farmers that once shored up Party strength in the Midwest have all fled. The rejection of Ellison was a rejection of the under 50 vote as well. This Party is an ex-Party. It is a dead pigeon.
13
@12: In twenty years or so, the non-Establishment Liberals may be a national force--as in, viable presidential campaigns, significant representation in Congress, Governorships, state legislatures. As long as they make sure that the Establishment Liberals and those funding sources don't follow them to the new party. And that this new party doubles in membership.
16
@15 Yea, he should go see the swells of Hillary supporters in the rust belt.

How about you get out of California while you're at it.
17
@12 and @15 So, are you our there party building in non-Seattle, non-CA? Because this change you think is going to happen isn't going to happen magically as "Disaster Socialism", no matter how much you fantasize about why people didn't vote for Clinton being ready for "real" leftism.
18
Sadly, @12 and @16 have nailed it.
20
@1: it's succeeding wonderfully.
@3: it's like they don't understand how insurance works, and they want all the seniors to sign up, and not the youth. I get it, it's more expensive for seniors, but the problem has always been not having young people sign up because it's a mediocre deal for them.
21
One of the shittiest jobs I've ever had was as a CNA at an old folk's home. I mean that quite literally- I wiped ass for a living, and came out of the experience knowing far more about the human GI tract than I ever wanted to know.

When I look at the Democratic Party's Establishment wing, I am reminded of the clients I served at the Old Folks' Home. Demented, aged, combative, ultraconservative and completely out of touch with reality. What the hell does Nancy Pelosi know about student loan debt? Hillary Clinton understands the needs of Rust Belt steelworkers as much as I understand the vagaries of Linear Algebra. Not one of these big city bicoastals has bothered to discuss the one thing that could get rural voters to vote Democrat- The Farm Bill.

The reason why the Democrats lost in 2016 isn't because there are hordes of secret Russian agents under every rock and tree conspiring to elect Jill Stein to the Presidency. Its because the policies Hillary Clinton has supported for decades- free trade, financial deregulation, ag policies that favor huge corporate farms over small family owned plots and union busting- have completely screwed the Midwest. People are desperate, their communities are ravaged by poverty, methamphetamine, and Wal-Mart. There's no jobs that pay a living wage there, and no way for small businesses to compete against the corporate behemoths that have swallowed every sector of the local economy, from how the food is grown to where it is sold.

And they just don't trust a former board member from Wal-Mart, since it happens to be Wal-Mart that's choking them to death. All you can do is wag your fingers at them and roll your eyes, whining about how "ignorant" you think they re. They aren't ignorant at all- they've correctly assessed the problem. That problem is you. And they've also come to the logical conclusion that you have to go, because you won't do a damn thing to help them.

And if that;s all you can offer them as an alternative to Donald Trump, well- you'd handed Trump is re-election and Republican majorities in both houses se real; years ahead of schedule.


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