Kretzschmar

-Nasa was started under Eisenhower, who was a Republican.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA
-The Clean Water Act was passed by Nixon.
-Anti-discrimination laws have been passed since 1871, and have been passed and enforced by both Republicans and Democrats.
-Nasa was created by Republicans.
Clean Water Act was created by Republicans.
-Republicans freed the slaves.
-Republicans defeated the Soviets in the Cold War.
-Republicans ended Vietnam, which was started by Democrats.
-The Republicans in Congress went on to pass the nation’s first ever Civil Rights Act
-Republicans passed the Constitutional Amendment that allowed Blacks to vote.
-Republicans passed the Constitutional Amendment that allowed women to vote.
-Republicans created the Tuskegee Institute
-Republicans repealed FDR's orders that Japanese Americans could be held, without habeas corpus, in internment camps

charlie Loc: Minneapolis, Minnesota

Don't be a stranger ! I notice you're from MO. I am most impressed with MO's programs that keep illegal immigrants from rushing to your borders. Well played. You're a newbie here but your MO credentials give you status :thumbup:

charlie Loc: Minneapolis, Minnesota

Great post, thank you.

hfb Loc: Northwestern Louisiana

With compassionate conservatism the widows and orphans still starve. Just more slowly.

Charlie44

Republican isn't necessarily synonymous with conservative, nor is liberal always synonymous with Democrats. Sadly, the Republican party which used to have a more moderate and even progressive wing has been taken over and is currently held hostage by extreme right-wing elements in the Tea Party. Theodore Roosevelt, a Republican President, first proposed a program of universal healthcare in 1905 and along with Wisconsin's Republican Governor, Frances McGovern, railed against the corrupting influence of corporations. Robert M. LaFollette, a progressive reformer emerged from and eventually split with the Republican Party.

If using our tax dollars to help to pay for the cost of healthcare is socialism, then the VA, our military, Medicare, public libraries, public schools, roads, parks, NASA, the Centers for Disease Control and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation which protects depositors money are all "socialist". Unless you want to do away with all of the things that we have decided we can do better together, drop the labels and the name calling and get used to it.

Do we really want to replace our military with private armies? Do we want to sell off the Grand Canyon, and our national parks to expunge the stigma of “socialism”? Do we really want to privatize our libraries, roads and beaches or get rid of Social Security, Medicare and VA hospitals just to satisfy this irrational fear of the “S” word?

Wisconsin has had a proud tradition of progressive politics and Milwaukee had socialist mayors for most of the past century., in 1936, Dan Hoan, socialist mayor of Milwaukee was on the cover of Time Magazine that called him “One of the nation’s ablest public servants”, claiming that “under him Milwaukee has become perhaps the best-governed city in the U.S.”

It would be useful to talk less about ideological and partisan labels and focus instead on solutions to the substantive issues that confront our country.

pjferrante Loc: California and Missouri

Don't look now, Blurry, but your ignorance is still showing. The political affiliation of liberals and conservatives changes from time to time. That's why I did not pose my original question in terms of political party. About the only thing you got right was President Reagan ending the cold war. But he had ample assistance from Mr. Gorbachev too. It would not have happened without a willing negotiating partner. Might the same result have been achieved with a Khrushchev, or even a Putin? I don't know, but I think not.

I have been retired for 8+ years, and had to retire early due to a health issue. Even so, Social Security and Medicare have, and continue to serve me very well, thank you. Had I invested 15% over the years instead, might I have done better? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But Social Security and Medicare are not investments. So your comparison is not valid and completely misses the point of the two programs. I expect that with some adjustments along the way, both programs will continue to serve their intended purpose for many generations to come. That is, if the teabagger lunatics in congress don't destroy them.

Perhaps it's time to quit whatever it is that's blurring your vision, distorting your memory, and closing your mind to the remote possibility that you don't know everything, and may even be wrong about what you think you know. I have learned over the years that I know very little. And what I don't know is far greater than what I believe to be true. And that what I believe to be true today, just may prove not to be true later.

This will be my last post on this thread. My thanks to all who participated intelligently and politely. And thanks also to those others who so openly displayed their hatred, intolerance, and ignorance.

pjferrante Loc: California and Missouri

So true, and very well stated. Thanks.

bluescreek Loc: N.C. Sandhills

I don't believe all those were "liberal" accomplishments, either. If you've ever noticed lots of those folks hate being called a liberal. One of your heroes, JFK was pretty conservative in many ways.
No way I'd ever believe the Founding Fathers had the values of a liberal, no way, the values of a Conservative, definitely.

ted45 Loc: Delaware

Are you suggesting that JFK would recognize todays Democrat party? I met the man and he was nothing like the drones that call themselves liberal today.

RDH

Blurryeyed, he did not say Democratic accomplishments, he said "Liberal," and Lincoln and Sen Everett McKinley Dirksen were liberals.

ted45 Loc: Delaware

Statistically the average American is both conservative and liberal. We all walk a line that wanders into both ideologies as required. This is a great Nation and capable of providing for the needs of everyone living here. However, the current two parties, Democrat and Republican, have taken the attitude that it has to be their way or no way. Neither serves the people they are sworn to represent. Neither puts the good of the people upper most on their 'to do' list. Both parties are obstructionist in nature. When one man, Harry Reid, can determine what laws will be voted on and stop all progress towards the compromise that has made us great, we all lose. When people like us can become mired on who is right and who is wrong instead finding common ground, we are lost.

There is no reason that we cannot provide every one of our citizens with good, fair healthcare. We do it for millions all over the world, but for some reason can't make it work here. We have sound immigration policies but a government unwilling to enforce the law. An open border without restriction is not an invitation to the poor and needy. It is an invitation to those that are working to destroy our society simply because we do not adhere to their way of worship or life. We can care for our elderly and provide a decent life for the sick, old and unemployed. However, there is an idea that cheating the system and getting a share of everyone else's labor is an acceptable way of life. The women of this country want the government out of their private life's and bedrooms. They want to be in control of their own bodies. At the same time they want the government to provide them with birth control, and abortions to fix their mistakes. Both parties are responsible for these problems.

We, as a people, need to do better and stop fighting ourselves to the benefit of the political class that is destroying our way of life.

dljen Loc: Central PA

Ted, that is a thoughtful and concise comment on the problems we, as a nation, face. Thank you.

bob44044 Loc: Ohio

Almost everything you stated is misguided and false. It would take too long to refute a simple statement. But here is just one example:

Recovering from the Great Depression was not a Democrat accomplishment. I was done by WWII. Even Roosevelt Administration knew and admitted that.

This was confirmed by two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate.

Two UCLA economists say they have figured out why the Great Depression dragged on for almost 15 years, and they blame a suspect previously thought to be beyond reproach: President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

After scrutinizing Roosevelt's record for four years, Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian conclude in a new study that New Deal policies signed into law 71 years ago thwarted economic recovery for seven long years.

"Why the Great Depression lasted so long has always been a great mystery, and because we never really knew the reason, we have always worried whether we would have another 10- to 15-year economic slump," said Ohanian, vice chair of UCLA's Department of Economics.

In an article in the August issue of the Journal of Political Economy, Ohanian and Cole blame specific anti-competition and pro-labor measures that Roosevelt promoted and signed into law June 16, 1933.

"President Roosevelt believed that excessive competition was responsible for the Depression by reducing prices and wages, and by extension reducing employment and demand for goods and services," said Cole, also a UCLA professor of economics. "So he came up with a recovery package that would be unimaginable today, allowing businesses in every industry to collude without the threat of antitrust prosecution and workers to demand salaries about 25 percent above where they ought to have been, given market forces. The economy was poised for a beautiful recovery, but that recovery was stalled by these misguided policies."

RichieC Loc: Adirondacks

Oh my god, you are wrong on every sningle point- no wonder the sound of crickets, what else do you hear when somone stands up , and proudly make a complete fool of themselves? it is the sound of incredulity.

The ACA is not an accomplishment, it is another expensive failure. The fact that you all wish to call ti it the ACA and NOT obamacare- a term he himself used at the begging, no longer wishing to have his name associated with it any longer, is proof enough.

Social Security is an insolvent Ponsi scheme that has been constantly raided to fund ever bigere gi overnement and among other travesty's and broken laws and promises, they have constantly moved the goal posts because the people who paid into it have had the gaul to live long enough to get some back.

Lincoln, and the very concept of anti-slavery and federal rights, were conservative in nature, they wished to conserve the country and not dissolve it. Was a war against southern democrats- that you lost.

The interstate system, was a reaction to the observation of WW2 generals in the sound military concept of moving troops and supplies easily and efficiently across a huge nation of a haphazard network of centuries old roads and bridges. The road to Alaska, which was essentially land locked, is another example. Not many liberals in the military then or now.

Give me a liberal or democrat that thought and acted like Kennedy, and any of us I'd vote for him. He was a democrat, who asked conservatives to get the US to the moon. Not one astronaut was a 1960's pot smokin, viet nam soldier spitting, flower-power liberal, nor were the guys with pocket protectors and slide rules who designed, built and launched us into space. Liberals were at woodstock. IN fact the constant liberal chant was, millions in space while people starve.

The founding fathers were against big centralized government, were for individual rights, and expected people to pull their own weight and see to their own ends, a central government eyed with suspicion and only there because of necessity. They trusted individuals, liberals do not. They were NOT liberal in your sense of the word. Conservatives, especially Constitutional conservatives like myself, wish to keep what they built intact, liberals suffer from the belief that they were wrong, and that they in their armchairs at home, could improve it.

Liberals are good at spending other peoples money, and hiding behind other peoples bravery.

ted45 Loc: Delaware

Thank you.