Trump Thread

[Husar]

Welp.



First the FISA requests now this, I look forward to seeing the doozy of stretch that'll be needed to sweep this one under the rug.

Heh, now that I happened upon another video, it turns out Trump was wiretapped but your video shows only half the truth because even this Nunes guy said Obama wasn't involved, and thereby sort of contradicted himself. So Trump was wiretapped and his claims about it are still bullhonkey as far as we know so far. What did you say in the other thread about reserving judgment? And while we're at it, the whole terror scare laws were enacted under Bush, Obama's terrible deed was using them more instead of repealing them.



Relevant part starts around 3:22.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

First effort to replace the ACA has been pulled by Speaker Ryan. United opposition from democrats and by ardent conservatives.

[a completely inoffensive name]

"This is a big fucking deal."

[Greyblades]

Saw that coming a mile off.

Heh, now that I happened upon another video, it turns out Trump was wiretapped but your video shows only half the truth because even this Nunes guy said Obama wasn't involved, and thereby sort of contradicted himself. So Trump was wiretapped and his claims about it are still bullhonkey as far as we know so far. What did you say in the other thread about reserving judgment? And while we're at it, the whole terror scare laws were enacted under Bush, Obama's terrible deed was using them more instead of repealing them.



Relevant part starts around 3:22.

I dont remember Nunes saying that, and I think I will stick with the unannotated videos thank you:



The best information is uncitated by the left's breed of talk show spin, spin you sneer at when it comes from the right, ah well.

As to Obama's involvement, this is not the dodge you think it is for it leaves either two possibilities: either Obama knew of it and you are wrong, or Obama wasnt aware and thus the US intelligence community spied upon Trump without the Obama's knowledge and consent.

So either Obama spied on his sucessor or he was incompetent and allowed the Intelligence community to become a loose cannon.

[HopAlongBunny]

I guess the Republicans got tired of winning:

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-us...-idUSKBN16V149

They had almost a decade to get it together...now they hold all the levers, but still have no plan.

[Montmorency]

Haven't we been over this? The matter under discussion isn't that Trump was spied upon, but that Trump and associates interacted with people who were being spied upon. We already had discussion on this subject for weeks. As far as we know the conduct of intelligence agencies was fully appropriate and legal, whereas not so for Nunes' conduct here.

[HopAlongBunny]

As far as I can tell the "Trump Associates" were bycatch.
The targets of surveillance were Russians; who they were talking to turned out to be Americans.
Perfectly legitimate; the controversy (if there is one) is pure deflection.

[Husar]

I dont remember Nunes saying that, and I think I will stick with the unannotated videos thank you:

[video]

The best information is uncitated by the left's breed of talk show spin, spin you sneer at when it comes from the right, ah well.

As to Obama's involvement, this is not the dodge you think it is for it leaves either two possibilities: either Obama knew of it and you are wrong, or Obama wasnt aware and thus the US intelligence community spied upon Trump without the Obama's knowledge and consent.

So either Obama spied on his sucessor or he was incompetent and allowed the Intelligence community to become a loose cannon.

Well, you're obviously impersonating the alt-right spin on this because you keep linking to one interview when he was clearly talking to reporters at least twice. The only unfortunate thing is that I can't find a full video of the interview(s) where he stands in front of the white house, except for ones where your alt-right friends cut out the part where he says Obama's involvement cannot be ruled out.

Your terrible bias becomes clear when you say I'd be wrong if Obama knew of it when I didn't claim that Obama didn't know a thing. I said we're none the wiser and when there are rumors you don't like, you say we should reserve judgment, yet here you are gloating over Nunes being vague since it's a rumor you like.
Or you can just take what Monty just said (I hadn't read about it before) and ask yourself why Trump would be in contact with foreigners who are under surveillance? Russians perhaps?

[Strike For The South]

Eat shit Paul Ryan

[Husar]

Eat shit Paul Ryan

Are you referring to this?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I have always conceived of the ACA as a health care plan more or less designed to fail in such a manner as to generate huge groundswell for the adoption of a national healthcare system along the lines of Canada or possibly of Germany. The extant insurance and healthcare system that obtained at the outset of the ACA was not and is not capable of absorbing the healthcare need and, despite good intentions, will have to jack rates on the insured etc. until people reach a point where they are deeply angry at the whole thing. At the same time, the expanded medicare rolls will be receiving coverage that is apparently cheaper and seems [may in fact be] no less effective than that being received by the increasingly high premium insureds. When the crisis hits, medicare will be expanded into some form of national health program.

With this defeat, I think this is now more or less inevitable. The within-the-system conservatives under Ryan never really expected to have to legislate on this -- figuring they would lose the White House and knowing they would never be veto-proof in the Senate -- so NOBODY took the precaution of having someone design a "what if we actually have to govern and live up to our campaign promises" plan to deal with healthcare despite having at LEAST six years to do it. The inside-the-system conservatives want to try to keep the good parts and get rid of the bad, but this will be difficult at best and unworkable at worst.

The ardent conservatives wanted the healthcare bill to have the following text: "The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 23 March 2010 is hereby repealed." They then want subsequent legislation that gets rid of most if not all federal oversight of healthcare, returning those decisions to the control of the states while allowing U.S. citizens to purchase healthcare across state lines. They very much see healthcare changes as something that happens AFTER the ACA is repealed. Repeal and replace, to them are separate activities that should happen in that sequence -- and their replacement approach would be far different.

Oddly enough, despite their mosaic construction of competing bases of support and regardless of political exploitation of some of those bases of support by party leadership, the Democrat party is the group with the consistent position on nationalizing healthcare and making it government apportioned to all. And they have been shockingly consistent in this over the years, with this being their goal for at least the past 30 years (with elements of the party having supported this goal since the turn of the 20th).

The GOP is divided against itself, the Dems have reason to hang together, and each year under ACA rules exacerbates the crisis and does so in a fashion that will yield the true-to-their-hearts goal.

Oddly enough, this may well mean that the Quixotic campaign of Bernie Sanders -- one of our few true Socialist Democrats -- may end up winning after all. His campaign damaged the Hillary "inevitability" mystique; that siphoning of belief in Hillary may well have kept some of Hillary's support home and given Trump just enough of an edge to win in the Electoral College. Without Hillary in the White House, the Dems can unify around defending Obamacare WITHOUT a Clinton trying to "improve" on it and unifying the GOP opposition. If the GOP cannot unify on this issue -- an issue on which many of them campaigned -- they will effectively allow the bill to accomplish its real purpose of nationalized healthcare. Once healthcare is run by the government, I think it unlikely that government will be prevented from nationalizing university education as a right....thus Bernie Sanders' policies become the ultimate success of his campaign.


I suppose I should be content that we are the last in the West to go this route, championing the individual over the collective (neither is perfect of course, but that is another thread). The march of history has been against us in this as more and more states turn to state oversight and control across the board --and I cannot even fault the intentions of those efforts. Earthly glory passes.

[Husar]

I suppose I should be content that we are the last in the West to go this route, championing the individual over the collective (neither is perfect of course, but that is another thread). The march of history has been against us in this as more and more states turn to state oversight and control across the board --and I cannot even fault the intentions of those efforts. Earthly glory passes.

I'd say the biggest issue with many "championing the individual"-approaches is that they seem to end up championing a few individuals while most individuals are collectively screwed. It sounds good in theory or if you're part of a priviliged collective of individuals, but fails in practice, much like certain ideologies on the extremely collective end.

[Greyblades]

Your terrible bias becomes clear when you say I'd be wrong if Obama knew of it when I didn't claim that Obama didn't know a thing.

Heh, now that I happened upon another video, it turns out Trump was wiretapped but your video shows only half the truth because even this Nunes guy said Obama wasn't involved, and thereby sort of contradicted himself.

Just stop. Tell us where Nunes said that Obama wasnt involved or cease your endless dodging.

Yet here you are gloating over Nunes being vague since it's a rumor you like.

Nunes is vague about Obama's involvment he is not vague about what he believes happened.

[Husar]

Just stop. Tell us where Nunes said that Obama wasnt involved or cease your endless dodging.

Post #511, 3:54. It's very clear that Obama wasn't involved in tapping Trump's phone because Trump's phones weren't tapped.

The part where Obama may have been involved in wiretapping refers to the wiretapping of other peoples' phones. If Trump calls them, his voice may be recorded, but again, you should then ask why Trump calls foreign criminals under surveillance. If Nunes isn't vague, why are you still trying to blame Obama?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

I'd say the biggest issue with many "championing the individual"-approaches is that they seem to end up championing a few individuals while most individuals are collectively screwed. It sounds good in theory or if you're part of a priviliged collective of individuals, but fails in practice, much like certain ideologies on the extremely collective end.

Economics is not a "fixed pie." Were it to be, then you can ONLY view capitalism as slavery and extortion of the many by the few. This is one of the implicit and flawed assumptions that undercuts the otherwise useful critique of capitalism proffered by Marx & Engels.

Economics is an expanding (and occasionally contracting but over the long haul expanding) pie. Thus the fortunes of most may hope of improvement over time.

To take advantage of these changes, numerous systems have developed over time. The West, having discarded autocratic/and oligarchic approaches [though not their lingering effects] has moved towards one of two macro "choices" for tapping into economic growth over time: equality of outcome and equality of opportunity.

I do not believe that equality of outcome can be achieved, though admittedly a noble goal in many ways, because individuals seeking to better the lot of themselves and their closest companions will seek to game any system to advantage. By contrast, I believe that striving for equality of opportunity faces fewer flaws -- though I acknowledge that this can never be perfected either. I view it as less bad.

[Husar]

Economics is not a "fixed pie." Were it to be, then you can ONLY view capitalism as slavery and extortion of the many by the few. This is one of the implicit and flawed assumptions that undercuts the otherwise useful critique of capitalism proffered by Marx & Engels.

Economics is an expanding (and occasionally contracting but over the long haul expanding) pie. Thus the fortunes of most may hope of improvement over time.

To take advantage of these changes, numerous systems have developed over time. The West, having discarded autocratic/and oligarchic approaches [though not their lingering effects] has moved towards one of two macro "choices" for tapping into economic growth over time: equality of outcome and equality of opportunity.

I do not believe that equality of outcome can be achieved, though admittedly a noble goal in many ways, because individuals seeking to better the lot of themselves and their closest companions will seek to game any system to advantage. By contrast, I believe that striving for equality of opportunity faces fewer flaws -- though I acknowledge that this can never be perfected either. I view it as less bad.

The view of economics as an ever expanding pie that everyone can get a bit more of with time is flawed in itself for several reasons:

1. It equates wealth with money and treats them both as absolutes. A person with five televisions will still feel poor compared to one with five hundred though. This sociological/psychological aspect is completely ignored.

2. It ignores that we live on a planet and cannot forever expand our use of resources unless we invent interstellar travel and various other things. These resources will eventually become a zero sum game as you can't just increase them as required. The same is true for the size of markets.

3. The rich can afford the tools required to expand at the expense of the poor. See e.g. Somalia where Europeans rampaged through and removed all the fish because the poor Somalians can't afford to prevent it.

4. As I posted somewhere as well lately, the system createsincentives to blame the poor as soon as they want more. See Somalia again where the fishermen who fought back with their own means were pirates and everyone was gloating over us killing them. Nevermind that we created the incentive for them to turn into pirates in the first place. Similar examples can be found within a country where poor people are called leeches while those who have plenty are praised as good businessmen for taking ever more.

5. The system inherently stabilizes the wealth of the wealthy and therefore the poverty of the poor, and this destroys the whole hoping for better fortunes part as social mobility decreases further and further. This is because the wealthy once again have the tools, whether through bribes, better (expensive, not universally accessible) education or otherwise, to influence the political and other systems to work for their own advantage and stabilize their position.

Point number one alone pretty much guarantees increased social unrest the bigger the gap between the richtest and poorest of a society. And from a moral point of view this gap is inexplicable. Most of the explanations I've heard so far are hollow nonsense.

I tend to see capitalism as a good system for growth, as you say it works well if and when it can expand and grow things. But in a world that cannot grow endlessly, such as the one on this planet, it will inevitably have to be replaced by a sustainable system that does not depend on endless growth.

As for everyone getting a piece of a growing pie, consider that investors, most of whom are very rich people, usually do not invest if they get a return of 5% or so if the pie grows by 2%. Thus they always make sure to slowly gobble up larger proportions of the ever-growing pie, whereas the poor can't do much against losing proportional ownership of the pie, regardless of the pie's growth, this makes them poorer as per point one. The fishermen who used to be fishermen and then lost even that low income as wealthy fisheries just took all the fish away to increase their own wealth are one example of this.

[a completely inoffensive name]

I have always conceived of the ACA as a health care plan more or less designed to fail in such a manner as to generate huge groundswell for the adoption of a national healthcare system along the lines of Canada or possibly of Germany. The extant insurance and healthcare system that obtained at the outset of the ACA was not and is not capable of absorbing the healthcare need and, despite good intentions, will have to jack rates on the insured etc. until people reach a point where they are deeply angry at the whole thing. At the same time, the expanded medicare rolls will be receiving coverage that is apparently cheaper and seems [may in fact be] no less effective than that being received by the increasingly high premium insureds. When the crisis hits, medicare will be expanded into some form of national health program.

With this defeat, I think this is now more or less inevitable. The within-the-system conservatives under Ryan never really expected to have to legislate on this -- figuring they would lose the White House and knowing they would never be veto-proof in the Senate -- so NOBODY took the precaution of having someone design a "what if we actually have to govern and live up to our campaign promises" plan to deal with healthcare despite having at LEAST six years to do it. The inside-the-system conservatives want to try to keep the good parts and get rid of the bad, but this will be difficult at best and unworkable at worst.

The ardent conservatives wanted the healthcare bill to have the following text: "The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 23 March 2010 is hereby repealed." They then want subsequent legislation that gets rid of most if not all federal oversight of healthcare, returning those decisions to the control of the states while allowing U.S. citizens to purchase healthcare across state lines. They very much see healthcare changes as something that happens AFTER the ACA is repealed. Repeal and replace, to them are separate activities that should happen in that sequence -- and their replacement approach would be far different.

Oddly enough, despite their mosaic construction of competing bases of support and regardless of political exploitation of some of those bases of support by party leadership, the Democrat party is the group with the consistent position on nationalizing healthcare and making it government apportioned to all. And they have been shockingly consistent in this over the years, with this being their goal for at least the past 30 years (with elements of the party having supported this goal since the turn of the 20th).

The GOP is divided against itself, the Dems have reason to hang together, and each year under ACA rules exacerbates the crisis and does so in a fashion that will yield the true-to-their-hearts goal.

Oddly enough, this may well mean that the Quixotic campaign of Bernie Sanders -- one of our few true Socialist Democrats -- may end up winning after all. His campaign damaged the Hillary "inevitability" mystique; that siphoning of belief in Hillary may well have kept some of Hillary's support home and given Trump just enough of an edge to win in the Electoral College. Without Hillary in the White House, the Dems can unify around defending Obamacare WITHOUT a Clinton trying to "improve" on it and unifying the GOP opposition. If the GOP cannot unify on this issue -- an issue on which many of them campaigned -- they will effectively allow the bill to accomplish its real purpose of nationalized healthcare. Once healthcare is run by the government, I think it unlikely that government will be prevented from nationalizing university education as a right....thus Bernie Sanders' policies become the ultimate success of his campaign.


I suppose I should be content that we are the last in the West to go this route, championing the individual over the collective (neither is perfect of course, but that is another thread). The march of history has been against us in this as more and more states turn to state oversight and control across the board --and I cannot even fault the intentions of those efforts. Earthly glory passes.

You are reading far too much into the future. Even if this does wind up leaving us with a national healthcare system, education is a separate battle altogether and nothing about these alternative systems championed by progressive Dems should be construed as a battle between "the individual" and the "collective".

Quite frankly, I think that kind of talk is demeaning to the history of the united states, where citizens have had to rise together as individuals in order to obtain the type of system we have today. The problem with viewing politics through such a Presidential centric lens is that you mistake the policy goals as top down directives that were passively accepted by the public once they got their free goodies.

While LBJ passed legislation, there were race riots. When FDR passed Social Security, elderly were dying of starvation. And the wave of new government intervention as ushered in by Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson went hand in hand with the 50+ years of labor riots and outright warfare in the streets.

National health care will be the law of the line not because of Obama or any other Democrat conspiracy. It will be because individual people will recognize that their best option is the government option and they will express that very loudly to their representatives.

[HopAlongBunny]

A nice summation (which means it sounds like me:p) of Trump on healthcare:

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_a...o_exactly.html

Or Trump on almost anything.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

You are reading far too much into the future. Even if this does wind up leaving us with a national healthcare system, education is a separate battle altogether and nothing about these alternative systems championed by progressive Dems should be construed as a battle between "the individual" and the "collective".

Quite frankly, I think that kind of talk is demeaning to the history of the united states, where citizens have had to rise together as individuals in order to obtain the type of system we have today. The problem with viewing politics through such a Presidential centric lens is that you mistake the policy goals as top down directives that were passively accepted by the public once they got their free goodies.

While LBJ passed legislation, there were race riots. When FDR passed Social Security, elderly were dying of starvation. And the wave of new government intervention as ushered in by Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson went hand in hand with the 50+ years of labor riots and outright warfare in the streets.

National health care will be the law of the line not because of Obama or any other Democrat conspiracy. It will be because individual people will recognize that their best option is the government option and they will express that very loudly to their representatives.

I did not label it a conspiracy, nor a plot. It has been a prime agenda item for more than a generation. They deeply and truly believe it to be the best option for healthcare for the nation. The believed, and do believe, that the broadened coverage (more people covered) generated by the ACA to have been an improvement over the status quo ante. But I refuse to believe they are stupid. They would have had sense to know that expanded coverage had to be paid for by someone and that this would result in the increased premiums and deductibles we are noting today. Nor has it taken the Dems any time whatsoever to push for the enactment of a "public option" in markets where the number of insurers has dropped to one, undercutting competition.

I don't believe they had some nefarious plot in mind taken from some bad movie plot. I think they did this as a "best we can do so far" effort, knowing that the likely failures/cracks in the system would trend TOWARDS and not away from a national healthcare system. Since they believe that any other system is ultimately unfair and actively detrimental to many of our citizens, this isn't a plot but a process.

You are, also, very probably correct that such a government-run system will be a majority preference in the very near future -- polls already show nearly two-thirds in favor of government mandating health insurance in some form, with more than half believing that the system requires major changes -- and darn few of those calling for major change are thinking in terms of fee-for-service.

I do not own, nor seek to purchase, a tinfoil hat.

The GOP needs to repeal the ACA, effective about three years hence, and get HHS configured to run the new healthcare program. There are important questions to be answered, such as the German or Canadian model, the allowance or abolition of private doctoring and the like and these changes will not be well made "on the fly."

[Pannonian]

I did not label it a conspiracy, nor a plot. It has been a prime agenda item for more than a generation. They deeply and truly believe it to be the best option for healthcare for the nation. The believed, and do believe, that the broadened coverage (more people covered) generated by the ACA to have been an improvement over the status quo ante. But I refuse to believe they are stupid. They would have had sense to know that expanded coverage had to be paid for by someone and that this would result in the increased premiums and deductibles we are noting today. Nor has it taken the Dems any time whatsoever to push for the enactment of a "public option" in markets where the number of insurers has dropped to one, undercutting competition.

I don't believe they had some nefarious plot in mind taken from some bad movie plot. I think they did this as a "best we can do so far" effort, knowing that the likely failures/cracks in the system would trend TOWARDS and not away from a national healthcare system. Since they believe that any other system is ultimately unfair and actively detrimental to many of our citizens, this isn't a plot but a process.

You are, also, very probably correct that such a government-run system will be a majority preference in the very near future -- polls already show nearly two-thirds in favor of government mandating health insurance in some form, with more than half believing that the system requires major changes -- and darn few of those calling for major change are thinking in terms of fee-for-service.

I do not own, nor seek to purchase, a tinfoil hat.

The GOP needs to repeal the ACA, effective about three years hence, and get HHS configured to run the new healthcare program. There are important questions to be answered, such as the German or Canadian model, the allowance or abolition of private doctoring and the like and these changes will not be well made "on the fly."

There should be studies on what would be the most cost efficient method given the reality on the ground. Over here, other than how alien we find it that not everyone gets coverage, the aspect of American healthcare that most stands out is how astoundingly expensive it is to get a reasonable level of coverage such as we get here. It's increasingly becoming the case here too, as the Tories are starving the NHS for funds which subsequently drives patients to A&E, which is far more expensive per patient seen than previously available other care.

[HopAlongBunny]

PoltiFact on various claims during the repeal/replace mess:

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-me...h-bill-stalls/

Obamacare is not in a deathspiral; it could be better

[a completely inoffensive name]

I did not label it a conspiracy, nor a plot. It has been a prime agenda item for more than a generation. They deeply and truly believe it to be the best option for healthcare for the nation. The believed, and do believe, that the broadened coverage (more people covered) generated by the ACA to have been an improvement over the status quo ante. But I refuse to believe they are stupid. They would have had sense to know that expanded coverage had to be paid for by someone and that this would result in the increased premiums and deductibles we are noting today. Nor has it taken the Dems any time whatsoever to push for the enactment of a "public option" in markets where the number of insurers has dropped to one, undercutting competition.

I don't believe they had some nefarious plot in mind taken from some bad movie plot. I think they did this as a "best we can do so far" effort, knowing that the likely failures/cracks in the system would trend TOWARDS and not away from a national healthcare system. Since they believe that any other system is ultimately unfair and actively detrimental to many of our citizens, this isn't a plot but a process.

You are, also, very probably correct that such a government-run system will be a majority preference in the very near future -- polls already show nearly two-thirds in favor of government mandating health insurance in some form, with more than half believing that the system requires major changes -- and darn few of those calling for major change are thinking in terms of fee-for-service.

I do not own, nor seek to purchase, a tinfoil hat.

The GOP needs to repeal the ACA, effective about three years hence, and get HHS configured to run the new healthcare program. There are important questions to be answered, such as the German or Canadian model, the allowance or abolition of private doctoring and the like and these changes will not be well made "on the fly."

Not trying to be hostile, but you are making a big assertion, 'Dems knowingly passed legislation that could explode the health care system' and then trying to walk it back by stating they acted with good intentions. They needed to compromise to win red-state Dems, and they went with 1990s GOP policy. The crux here was making sure healthy people signed up in enough numbers to cover the cost of those with pre-existing conditions, which didn't happen. That's on the right-wing think tanks who came up with the policy, not the Dems for giving it a shot.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Not trying to be hostile, but you are making a big assertion, 'Dems knowingly passed legislation that could explode the health care system' and then trying to walk it back by stating they acted with good intentions. They needed to compromise to win red-state Dems, and they went with 1990s GOP policy. The crux here was making sure healthy people signed up in enough numbers to cover the cost of those with pre-existing conditions, which didn't happen. That's on the right-wing think tanks who came up with the policy, not the Dems for giving it a shot.

Perhaps I was wrong. To be fair, I cannot claim to know what was on their minds as they made their decision. I am not a telepath. I could well be projecting my own sense of "how could they really think it would work otherwise" onto those past decisions.

And there are strong similarities between elements of the ACA and the healthcare efforts enacted under Gov. Romney in Massachusetts -- a fact pointed up during the 2012 campaign. I am not personally aware of the basic elements in the ACA having been promulgated in "right wing" think tanks, but I also must note that I do not regularly read the policy papers put forward by such. So I defer to your knowledge (though a cite or two for me to check upon would not be thought amiss).


For a new healthcare plan to work, all citizens must receive adequate healthcare (the support for few or no exclusions/concept of health care as and individual right is a clear majority position). To do so, funds contributed by the relative healthy must be higher than that required for their care, in order to defray the costs of those who have fallen grievously ill and could never hope to afford the full cost of care for themselves.

The ACA has not, so far, managed to procure the numbers needed. What can be done to improve participation?

While wealth strongly correlates with health, those in good health exceed those who possess wealth. How can the system be crafted to tap into this properly?

What constitutes adequate healthcare and what, if any, limitations should be placed upon healthcare?

If the government runs healthcare, what mandates must exist for that healthcare to be administered fairly and effectively?

[HopAlongBunny]

Score one for the Republicans
They made good on their 2009 pledge to stop health-care:

http://www.theonion.com/article/gop-...ts-healt-55630

[a completely inoffensive name]

Perhaps I was wrong. To be fair, I cannot claim to know what was on their minds as they made their decision. I am not a telepath. I could well be projecting my own sense of "how could they really think it would work otherwise" onto those past decisions.

And there are strong similarities between elements of the ACA and the healthcare efforts enacted under Gov. Romney in Massachusetts -- a fact pointed up during the 2012 campaign. I am not personally aware of the basic elements in the ACA having been promulgated in "right wing" think tanks, but I also must note that I do not regularly read the policy papers put forward by such. So I defer to your knowledge (though a cite or two for me to check upon would not be thought amiss).

Your questions after this section deserve a separate reply. But as for sources, a couple of newspapers have attempted to dig into the history of the idea, usually pointing to the Heritage foundation as the platform which cultivated the idea in the early 90s.
1. https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001...41190920152366
2. https://www.forbes.com/sites/theapot.../#405b35055fe9
3. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/15/he...ervatives.html

The smoking gun they like to point to is a publication from the Heritage Foundation in 1989: http://thf_media.s3.amazonaws.com/1989/pdf/hl218.pdf
Admittedly, it does say "Nothing here should be construed to reflect the views of the Heritage Foundation". But the idea at least was floated around in those circles.

Also, while Hillary Clinton was pushing for HillaryCare after the 1992 election, Congress asked the Congressional Budgetary Office to begin considering the impact and treatment of an individual mandate as part of an alternative Congressional Reform package: https://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/fi...orts/doc38.pdf

Yes, RomneyCare did make use of the mandate. In fact, during the second half of the Bush Administration, the individual mandate seemed like a bipartisan solution that both Conservatives and Liberals could embrace.
A bipartisan bill was proposed in the Senate in 2007 that essentially was the pre-cursor to the ACA, mandate included: https://www.congress.gov/bill/110th-...334/cosponsors
Once Obama was elected however, well...suddenly the idea became a lot less palatable.

I wish I could dig into this deeper and make a more convincing case rather than just throw you a bunch of links, but later this week I will have some more free time to engage your reply a bit further.

[HopAlongBunny]

Back to the Future? Or The more things change...?

http://www.motherjones.com/media/201...e-10-takeaways

Racist, divided, with patriots and takers; full circle or business as usual?

[HopAlongBunny]

The Freedom Caucus makes a pitch to fix Obamacare real good:

https://wonkette.com/615068/revenge-...iacs-from-hell

Its exactly as bad as you would expect

[Strike For The South]

Just came over the wire that Goursch is being pushed through. Mitch McConnel really is such a shameless little troll. I guess this is the final chapter in Borks legacy? It's interesting though. The first two of these knock down, drag out fights came about in good faith. Bork and Thomas both had plausible reasons why they could be considered unqualified.

Borks views are extreme and very much outside of the mainstream, he also answered questions truthfully during his confirmation which didn't help. Now of course, as the executive you make the pick. However, while it is assumed that your pick will align with you ideologically, it is not necessarily assumed that they swing so far to one side. Bork was ideologicaly pure pick for a position which Before had been more measured and flexible. He was sort of the first shot of the moral majority which eventually would rain down a bunch of bullshit upon American government. Those people need to go away.

Of course there really isn't much to say about Thomas issue. If those allegations were proven, there should be no way he sits on the court.

After Thomas is when the Rs started blocking Clintons appointments, then the Ds did the same thing to Bush, and here we are today.

[a completely inoffensive name]

Just came over the wire that Goursch is being pushed through. Mitch McConnel really is such a shameless little troll. I guess this is the final chapter in Borks legacy? It's interesting though. The first two of these knock down, drag out fights came about in good faith. Bork and Thomas both had plausible reasons why they could be considered unqualified.

Borks views are extreme and very much outside of the mainstream, he also answered questions truthfully during his confirmation which didn't help. Now of course, as the executive you make the pick. However, while it is assumed that your pick will align with you ideologically, it is not necessarily assumed that they swing so far to one side. Bork was ideologicaly pure pick for a position which Before had been more measured and flexible. He was sort of the first shot of the moral majority which eventually would rain down a bunch of bullshit upon American government. Those people need to go away.

Of course there really isn't much to say about Thomas issue. If those allegations were proven, there should be no way he sits on the court.

After Thomas is when the Rs started blocking Clintons appointments, then the Ds did the same thing to Bush, and here we are today.

When do we get past all the parliamentary bullshit and start having congressmen beat the shit out of senators with canes?

[Strike For The South]

When do we get past all the parliamentary bullshit and start having congressmen beat the shit out of senators with canes?

i would pay money to see Schumer and McConnell go at it.