Last nights debate

[dananderson32]

and why is Obama a socialist for wanting to roll back the bush tax cuts and implement the clinton ones back in place when in 2000 John McCain himself opposed the bush tax cuts as it cut out the middle class and only gave the cuts to the wealthy..........now does that make John McCain a socialist for opposing bush's tax cuts in 2000 and now all the sudden anyone who opposes the bush tax cuts (the very one McCain "used" to oppose) is a socialist ...............ah **** it Obama is anti-American and a muslim

[dananderson32]

The fear mongering Obama is a celebrity, elitist, muslim, socialist, communist **** just isn't cutting it with the American public anymore and they are sick of this bashing full of lies **** the republicans continue to spew that half this country is "anti-american" that people who live in urban areas are "un-american" and the republicans are slowly watching their power dwindle away and there is nothing they can do about it :beerbang: :beerbang: :beerbang:

[dananderson32]

"Appearing on Meet the Press, Powell acknowledged--finally!--that he and the Bush administration misled the nation about the WMD threat posed by Iraq before the war. Specifically, he said that he was wrong when he appeared before the UN Security Council on February 5, 2003, and alleged that Iraq had developed mobile laboratories to produce biological weapons."


Powell Admits False WMD Claim

[BoKnows]

yeah when you come up with some drummed up false intelligence (i.e. wmd's) and sell that to the congress whom at the time was controlled by republicans of course they are gonna say yes

See Dan, there is thing called the internet where information is free you should check it out sometime and then you would not seem so ignorant to your peers:thumbs: Oh wait I forgot you know everything already...sorry.



U.S. removes 'yellowcake' from Iraq - Conflict in Iraq - MSNBC.com

[BoKnows]

yeah when you come up with some drummed up false intelligence (i.e. wmd's) and sell that to the congress whom at the time was controlled by republicans of course they are gonna say yes

Again clueless as usual with factless staments without merit or base


snopes.com: Weapons of Mass Destruction Quotes

It was all Bush and the Republicans..........keep drinking the kool aid...I hear Jim Jones loves the stuff.

[BIGBALLER]

Dan you have to do better with your research that study which ranked the US 37th was done in 2000 and was performed by a socialist but take some time and read the article below it might enlighten you.

Ranking the U.S. Health-Care System
B Y J I M P E R O N
Nov 2007


It is curious that the United States ranked below
Europe in the World Health Organization’s 2000
World Health Report, which rated 191 countries’
medical systems. In his documentary Sicko, socialist
Michael Moore makes hay out of the fact that the United
States placed 37th, behind even Morocco, Cyprus,
and Costa Rica. This ranking is used to “prove” that
state-controlled health care is superior to the “free market.”
This ranking is curious because the actual life
expectancy of the average American differs very little
from that of the average
European. At birth, average
life expectancy in the European
Union is 78.7. For the
average American it is 78.
And this doesn’t adjust for
factors that can affect the
averages which are unrelated
to health care, such as lifestyle
choices, accident rates, crime
rates, and immigration. Health
isn’t entirely about longevity
but it certainly is a major
component.
What is not mentioned by
Moore, or others citing the WHO report, are the measures
being used to rate the various countries and who is
doing the measuring. There are many ways to nudge
ratings in one direction or another that are not directly
related to the actual item being measured.
For instance, one might produce a study on transportation.
The purpose of transportation is to get people
from where they are to where they wish to be. You
might rate how quickly people can move, how cheaply
they can move relative to their income, how conveniently
they can move, and how free they are to move.
You would think the United States would rate high
in such a study. Americans tend to be wealthier than
the rest of the world.There is widespread ownership of
cars. Gasoline prices are lower than in most other countries.
On average, the typical American can travel quicker,
cheaper, and more conveniently than people in most
parts of the world. But what if this index included other
factors as well? For instance, if a major component was
the percentage of commuters
who use public transportation,
that would push the
United States far down in the
ranking. A larger percentage
of the people in other countries
have no other option but
public transportation.
In 2000, when the report
was issued,WHO was run by
Gro Harlem Brundtland, a
former prime minister of
Norway and a socialist. She
doesn’t think the results of a
health system alone are important.
Rather, she wants to know if the system is “fair.”
In introducing the WHO report she wrote that while
the goal of a health system “is to improve and protect
health,” it also has “other intrinsic goals [that] are concerned
with fairness in the way people pay for health
care.” She is clear about the ideological factors she
B Y J I M P E R O N
Ranking the U.S. Health-Care System
13 NOVEMBER 2007
Jim Peron (peron@orcon.net.nz) is a writer living in Berlin, Germany.
Gro Harlem Brundtland
WHO
thinks are important: “Where health and responsiveness
are concerned, achieving a high average level is not good
enough: the goals of a health system must also include
reducing inequalities, in ways that improve the situation of
the worst-off. In this report attainment in relation to
these goals provides the basis for measuring the performance
of health systems.”
True to her ideological roots, Brundtland prefers
socialized medicine over private care. Drawing her first
conclusion about what makes a good medical system,
she declares: “Ultimate responsibility for the performance
of a country’s health system lies with government.
The careful and responsible
management of the well-being of the
population—stewardship—is the very
essence of good government. The
health of people is always a national
priority: government responsibility for
it is continuous and permanent.”
One WHO discussion paper states,
regarding “fairness” in financing, “we
consider only the distribution, not the
level, as there is no consensus on what
the level of health spending should
be.” Equal results, not necessarily good
results, are the focus.
When Moore or others refer to the
WHO index as proof that private
health care doesn’t work, they aren’t
being totally honest because they fail
to disclose that the index lowers the
scores of systems that don’t satisfy
socialist presumptions.
A Second Rigged Study
The New York Times in August editorialized that
American health care “lags well behind other
advanced nations.”The newspaper relied in part on the
WHO rankings as proof. For the rest, it relied on a
more recent study by the Commonwealth Fund. But
that study, which compared the United States to five
other wealthy countries, has weaknesses similar to the
WHO study.
The Commonwealth Fund marked down the United
States partly because “All other major industrialized
nations provide universal health coverage, and most of
them have comprehensive benefits packages with no
cost-sharing by the patients.” Again the American system
loses points because it doesn’t provide socialized
medicine. And the Times neglected to note that “no
cost-sharing” means the people have paid through taxes
whether they receive the care or not.
Non-Emergency Visits
The United States also was penalized because seeing
a physician for non-emergency reasons is harder to
do on nights and weekends than in the other five
nations. The Fund said “many report
having to wait six days or more for
an appointment with their own doctors.”
The survey didn’t look at the treatment
of serious conditions. Waiting
weeks or months for chemotherapy is
not held against a health-care system,
but waiting a few days to have a check
up is.Waiting time for “elective” surgery
is counted (the United States
was a close second to Germany), but
waiting time for non-elective, serious
surgery did not count, though that is
precisely where socialist systems do
the worst.
This issue is not unknown to the
Commonwealth Fund. In 1999 it
published The Elderly’s Experiences with
Health Care in Five Nations, which
found significant delays for “serious
surgery.” Only 4 percent of the American
seniors reported long waits for
serious surgery. The rate was 11 percent in Canada and
13 percent in Britain. For non-serious surgery the differences
were more obvious: 7 percent in the United
States, 40 percent in Canada, and 51 percent in Britain.
In the latest survey, the United States came in dead
last for health “safety,” but many of the scores were only
a few points apart. For instance, 15 percent of American
patients said they “believed a medical mistake” had been
made in their treatment within the last two years.
Notice this is merely patient perception and nothing
THE FREEMAN: Ideas on Liberty 14
J i m P e ron
The Commonwealth
Fund marked down
the United States
partly because
“All other major
industrialized nations
provide universal
health coverage, and
most of them have
comprehensive
benefits packages
with no cost-sharing
by the patients.”
objective. But the best score was in Britain, where 12
percent said this.
The United States is also marked down because 23
percent of patients report delayed or incorrect results on
medical tests they took. That is far worse than the best
country, Germany, at 9 percent. But what constitutes a
delay? If a result is expected in a week but takes two,
that is a delay. But if it is expected in three weeks and
arrives then, that isn’t a delay. Thus what constitutes
a delay depends on expectations, leading to counterintuitive
results.
The United States also lost credit because fewer
Americans report having a regular doctor for five years
or more. But Americans are more
mobile than many other people.CNN
reports that Americans move every five
years on average. In comparison,
Britain has a moving rate of 10 percent
a year, or an average of once a decade.
And 60 percent of those move about
three miles.
Freer to Change Doctors
Americans are also freer to change
doctors if they wish. Britain
requires patients to sign up with physicians,
and once they do so, they are pretty much stuck
unless they want to end up on the waiting list of another
physician. Patients often have to wait to get on the
books of a physician and only then can they be treated;
that is, they wait to get on a wait list. This is true even
for heart transplants. The inevitable waiting is a disincentive
to change doctors.
Another measure used by the Commonwealth Fund
is centralization of medical records. If a country has a
system that allows doctors anywhere to tap into the
patients’ records, it is rated higher.The United States has
no centralized database and so is rated lower. Many
Americans may prefer to have their records private and
dispersed. When the Clinton plan was proposed in
1993, one of the rallying points that helped defeat it was
the centralization of health records.
Out-of-pocket expenses were counted against a system
as well. In socialized health care these expenses are
zero or very low but are replaced with taxes. Taxes,
however, don’t lower a country’s score because the care
“is free.”
Countries were also judged on the number of
patient complaints. But different cultures have different
attitudes toward complaining. Jeremy Laurance wrote in
the Belfast Telegraph recently that the National Health
Service needs “a healthy dose of
American belligerence.”
Finally, the United States is ranked
last among the six nations surveyed
in infant mortality.What is not discussed
is that nations define infant
mortality differently. Any infant,
regardless of size or weight or premature
status, who shows sign of life is
counted as a live birth in the United
States. Germany, which ranks number
one in the Commonwealth Fund survey,
doesn’t count as a live birth any
infant with a birth weight under 500 grams (one
pound). How valuable is a comparison under those circumstances?
One could easily design a survey that would rank
American health care high and other nations low. But
this does not mean the American system is what it
should be. Its successes and innovation can be attributed
to the vestiges of freedom, but government has saddled
the system with so much intervention that it is far from
market oriented. Instead of worrying about irrelevant
international rankings, we should be working toward
freeing the medical market.
15 NOVEMBER 2007

[dananderson32]

and what was the # 1 reason why people won't be voting for johnny mac in 2 weeks


ah yes sarah palin ........keep adding fuel to the fire sarah ...........shes the # 1 person to replace you johnny mac in case u die .........too bad she scares the **** out of the American people........putting that "country first" motto to work johnny mac looks like its gonna work out good for you

and heres a shocker democrat votes switching to GOP votes

The Charleston Gazette - West Virginia News and Sports - News - More W.Va. voters say machines are switching votes 

[dananderson32]

buying the same priced clothes as joe the plumber shes gonna crack down on washington and get all those big spenders and free loaders out of there :laughing: :laughing:


GOP spends $150,000 for Palin's wardrobe - John McCain News - MSNBC.com

Newsvine - AP INVESTIGATION: Alaska funded Palin kids' travel

nothing like spending your states tax payer dollars Palin has charged the state $21,012 for her three daughters' 64 one-way and 12 round-trip commercial flights since she took office in December 2006. In some other cases, she has charged the state for hotel rooms for the girls.

Shes gonna reform the way gov't is run though and put it back on the side of the people right after shes done sucking her people dry for her children's traveling expenses on "official business"

need i remind you she has never read the constitution

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[dananderson32]

Hmmmm...did we go to war with Iraq because of 9/11 or because of Sadaam defiance against NATO, and his WMD's? Did Bush do this on his own or did congress also agree?Please explain Dan.

yeah when you come up with some drummed up false intelligence (i.e. wmd's) and sell that to the congress whom at the time was controlled by republicans of course they are gonna say yes

[BoKnows]

oh yes engaging in war for misguided reasons to the public thats a clueless statement ........especially since several people have come out of the bush administration saying this very thing....

Hmmmm...did we go to war with Iraq because of 9/11 or because of Sadaam defiance against NATO, and his WMD's? Did Bush do this on his own or did congress also agree?Please explain Dan.

[BIGBALLER]

and this idea that people look in on this country with a vengeance (besides terrorist) is laughable most countries look at us as a joke and that we have our heads in our ass .............were so far behind on education, health care, wages and the inability to stay up with the cost of living, a high poverty rate etc......

Poverty in America

This section of DiscoverTheNetworks examines the causes and characteristics of poverty in America. In his August 28, 2007 article, "How "Poor" Are the Poor?" (published by Front Page Magazine), Robert Rector provides an excellent introduction to this topic:


Poverty is an important and emotional issue. Last year, the Census Bureau released its annual report on poverty in the United States declaring that there were 37 million poor persons living in this country in 2005, roughly the same number as in the preceding years. According to the Census report, 12.6 percent of Amer*icans were poor in 2005; this number has varied from 11.3 percent to 15.1 percent of the population over the past 20 years.

To understand poverty in America, it is important to look behind these numbers—to look at the actual living conditions of the individuals the government deems to be poor. For most Americans, the word "poverty" suggests destitution: an inability to provide a family with nutritious food, clothing, and reasonable shelter. But only a small number of the 37 million per*sons classified as "poor" by the Census Bureau fit that description. While real material hardship certainly does occur, it is limited in scope and severity. Most of America's "poor" live in material conditions that would be judged as comfortable or well-off just a few generations ago. Today, the expenditures per person of the lowest-income one-fifth (or quintile) of house*holds equal those of the median American household in the early 1970s, after adjusting for inflation.

The following are facts about persons defined as "poor" by the Census Bureau, taken from various gov*ernment reports:
Forty-three percent of all poor households actu*ally own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a three-bedroom house with one-and-a-half baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.


Eighty percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, in 1970, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.


Only 6 percent of poor households are over*crowded. More than two-thirds have more than two rooms per person.


The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)


Nearly three-quarters of poor households own a car; 31 percent own two or more cars.


Ninety-seven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.


Seventy-eight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.


Eighty-nine percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and more than a third have an automatic dishwasher.
As a group, America's poor are far from being chronically undernourished. The average consump*tion of protein, vitamins, and minerals is virtually the same for poor and middle-class children and, in most cases, is well above recommended norms. Poor children actually consume more meat than do higher-income children and have average protein intakes 100 percent above recommended levels. Most poor children today are, in fact, supernour*ished and grow up to be, on average, one inch taller and 10 pounds heavier than the GIs who stormed the beaches of Normandy in World War II.

While the poor are generally well nourished, some poor families do experience temporary food shortages. But even this condition is relatively rare; 89 percent of the poor report their families have "enough" food to eat, while only 2 percent say they "often" do not have enough to eat.

Overall, the typical American defined as poor by the government has a car, air conditioning, a refrig*erator, a stove, a clothes washer and dryer, and a microwave. He has two color televisions, cable or satellite TV reception, a VCR or DVD player, and a stereo. He is able to obtain medical care. His home is in good repair and is not overcrowded. By his own report, his family is not hungry and he had suf*ficient funds in the past year to meet his family's essential needs. While this individual's life is not opulent, it is equally far from the popular images of dire poverty conveyed by the press, liberal activists, and politicians.

Of course, the living conditions of the average poor American should not be taken as representing all the poor. There is actually a wide range in living conditions among the poor. For example, a third of poor households have both cellular and landline telephones. A third also have telephone answering machines. At the other extreme, however, approxi*mately one-tenth have no phone at all. Similarly, while the majority of poor households do not expe*rience significant material problems, roughly 30 percent do experience at least one problem such as overcrowding, temporary hunger, or difficulty get*ting medical care.

The remaining poverty in the U.S. can be reduced further, particularly poverty among chil*dren. There are two main reasons that American children are poor: Their parents don't work much, and fathers are absent from the home.

In good economic times or bad, the typical poor family with children is supported by only 800 hours of work during a year: That amounts to 16 hours of work per week. If work in each family were raised to 2,000 hours per year—the equivalent of one adult working 40 hours per week throughout the year— nearly 75 percent of poor children would be lifted out of official poverty.

Father absence is another major cause of child poverty. Nearly two-thirds of poor children reside in single-parent homes; each year, an additional 1.5 million children are born out of wedlock. If poor mothers married the fathers of their children, almost three-quarters would immediately be lifted out of poverty.

While work and marriage are steady ladders out of poverty, the welfare system perversely remains hostile to both. Major programs such as food stamps, public housing, and Medicaid continue to reward idleness and penalize marriage. If welfare could be turned around to require work and encourage marriage, poverty among children would drop substantially.

However, while renewed welfare reform can help to reduce poverty, under current conditions, such efforts will be partially offset by the poverty-boost*ing impact of the nation's immigration system. Each year, the U.S. imports, through both legal and illegal immigration, hundreds of thousands of additional poor persons from abroad. As a result, one-quarter of all poor persons in the U.S. are now first-genera*tion immigrants or the minor children of those immigrants. Roughly one in ten of the persons counted among the poor by the Census Bureau is either an illegal immigrant or the minor child of an illegal. As long as the present steady flow of poverty-prone persons from foreign countries continues, efforts to reduce the total number of poor in the U.S. will be far more difficult. A sound anti-poverty strategy must seek to increase work and marriage, reduce illegal immigration, and increase the skill level of future legal immigrants...

[dananderson32]

Baller, to the base of the left these are very important talking points. :laughing:Who cares about Obama's scary foreign policy when you have things like this to worry about.

foreign policy is scary enough to get Colin Powell on board right? oh wait let me guess he endorsed Obama cause Obama is black :bang: :bang: dumb me

[dananderson32]

Another very clueless statment, but I actually like reading them as it reaffirms my belief that the base of the left is oh so......ah nevermind:laughing:

oh yes engaging in war for misguided reasons to the public thats a clueless statement ........especially since several people have come out of the bush administration saying this very thing....

[dananderson32]

I'm sorry Dan I keep forgetting your age. You stated we are behind on health care to other countries and I showed you that we are NOT unless you have experienced these wait times. And about the VP comment I really believe we have greater issues concerning our country then if our VP is going to try and get in there and help with making policy changes.

when the costs are so high that people need to put food on the table first before they can worry about paying outrageous amounts for health care i consider that behind other countries and we rank in the 30-40's in that

The World Health Organization's ranking of the world's health systems

make that #37

[BoKnows]

I'm sorry Dan I keep forgetting your age. You stated we are behind on health care to other countries and I showed you that we are NOT unless you have experienced these wait times. And about the VP comment I really believe we have greater issues concerning our country then if our VP is going to try and get in there and help with making policy changes.

Baller, to the base of the left these are very important talking points. :laughing:Who cares about Obama's scary foreign policy when you have things like this to worry about.