You Republicans created a strengthened "Imperial Presidency" under Nixon, so what are you complaining about now.

Hal, when you speak of how horrible ObamaCare is, you really do not know the facts. Read the following article, just published by Vanity Fair.

http://www.vanityfair.com/online/eichenwald/2013/09/republicans-know-obamacare-will-work

You have not discerned that the Republican Party has been lying, lying, lying about ObamaCare in an effort to bring down Obama. It isn't about medical care to them. It is about Obama and destroying the single most important accomplishment of his presidency. This is because he is a Democrat and because he is Black.

Yes, "Truth hurts when it is brought to light." You must be in deep pain about now.

First of all, Hal, our country is not a "once great country." It is a great country now, and we have a lot more freedoms than people have in most of the 18 countries where I have traveled or lived.

I bring bigots into the situation because bigotry is one of the prime motivating factors for the hatred of Obama. You can accuse me of being one, but I have spent a large part of my life working actively for the civil rights of African-Americans, so you are barking up the wrong tree.

What is happening in this country is that the members of the "Party of Stupid" are trying to block every social advance anyone proposes, even those that have been passed by the Legislature and approved by the Supreme Court. To do this, they are quite willing to bring government to a halt. Too bad. This will amount to shooting themselves in the foot, and will cause untold financial suffering to many people in the USA. In the long run, however, it will result in a cleansing of the system as these rightwing nut jobs get cast out of power.

ObamaCare is here to stay. And people will generally like it, just as they like Medicare and Social Security. The attempt by the Republicans to gain another year before ObamaCare goes into effect is a sad one, doomed to failure.

We should all remember that these voices against ObamaCare started just as Obama came into office -- and a lot of them because he is Black, not because of his policies.

He's got the Republicans painted into a corner. Stop the functioning of government and you'll suffer in the elections coming up. Obviously Republicans don't care how much they damage the economics and faith people put in our government. Just as long as they have their way, they'll shoot themselves and everyone else in the foot.

I don't know where you left uour tinfoil hat, but some of our readers might enjoy the following rightwing lexicon:

Kenya: an island in the Hawaiian chain where President Obama was born.

Bush tax cuts: magic legislation guaranteed to create jobs; passed in June 2001 when unemployment stood at 4.5%. Additional cuts in May 2003. Still in effect when U. S. economy crashed in 2008; still in effect in October 2009 when unemployment hit 10%. Cannot be repealed under any circumstances because this will cause a rise in unemployment.

Free enterprise: it’s just what patriots (see below) do; includes the right of British Petroleum to pollute the Gulf of Mexico without government regulation, the right of Wal-Mart to bribe officials of Mexico and drive out competition and the right of Rupert Murdoch’s people bribe police and hack into private cell phone and email accounts of citizens.

Fox News: the last bastion of truth where free enterprise is always worshiped.

Patriot: any American who listens exclusively to Fox News, who agrees that taxes on billionaires can never be raised because it will make them sad, or something; a person who feels it is better to deny health care to other Americans, because, well, if you love America, you don’t want poor Americans to love America and be healthy, too; may also be an American who supports family values and would love to die for his or her country, except when they might want to commit adultery, personally, or actually have the chance to enlist and get shot at by real enemies of the United States. (See: Cheney, Gingrich, Romney, etc.)

Patriotism: what a billionaire or millionaire feels when he or she sees other people’s children sent off to fight to protect his or her freedom, while simultaneously keeping tax rates low (flag pin displayed in your lapel proves your patriotism, but serving in the military under the actual real flag does not if you’d like to marry your same-sex partner).

Unplugging granny: the act of disconnecting an elderly American from a life support system; inevitable result when godless, secular, humanist liberals (who are really Nazis) try to extend health care to millions of other Americans who can’t afford to be connected in the first place.

Red-blooded American: often, a grumpy older individual, predominantly white and Christian, but not always; may own several guns and tote a Bible. Fears Big Government, because government is the problem not the solution, especially when government might curtail in any way government-provided health care benefits. The opposite of liberal Americans (also known as Fascists) who believe all Americans should have access to affordable health care. (See: socialized medicine, following.)

Socialized medicine: any attempt to extend health care coverage to a 38-year old stay-at-home mother who suddenly develops multiple sclerosis, a 27-year-old type-1 diabetic who has just been denied coverage because of preexisting conditions and a 53-year-old factory worker who has lost his coverage after his company (see free enterprise, above) in Wisconsin closed operations and moved all assembly operations to China.

Job creator: any business person who can figure out how to avoid paying taxes to the government he or she purports to love (often seen wearing a flag pin) by hiding profits in the Cayman Islands and simultaneously closing American factories and shipping jobs to India.

Public sector workers (also union thug, below): men and women who undermine individual economic freedoms and pose an insidious threat to free markets because their jobs cannot be outsourced to Mexico or Honduras.

Religion, freedom of: one of the most important rights granted to us through the wisdom of the Founding Fathers; any attempt to require a Catholic institution to offer birth control coverage to female employees is an “attack on religion.”

Speech, freedom of; petition, right to; assembly, right of: what conservatives do when they gather to hear Sarah Palin speak. Not to be confused the right of the Dixie Chicks to criticize the president or with the Occupy Wall Street movement, since those people look funny and according to Fox News don’t bathe often enough, and even if they did it wouldn’t matter because they’re communists, anyway. Conservatives know that the U. S. Constitution was intended originally to protect only red-blooded Americans (see above), which includes those who agree with every syllable Glenn Beck ever uttered, including any babbling he did when he was still a baby.

Terrorist cell: any group of Muslim Americans who might wish to exercise their religion, freedom of (see above) by building a mosque, pretty much anywhere in America.

Judicial activist: a liberal judge who might vote, for example, to overturn The Defense of Marriage Act.

A strict constructionist: a conservative judge who might vote, for example, to overthrow the health care law; also a judge who might vote to overthrow the decision of a state supreme court and award an election to a conservative candidate. A strict constructionist understands that the Founding Fathers (see below) who wrote the U. S. Constitution intended corporations to be considered persons so they might speak their institutional minds and dump their tens of millions into all elections.

Slut: a young college-age woman who disagrees with Rush Limbaugh and can’t imagine why anyone would sleep with that fat bag of puddings.

Union thug: any worker who organizes along with others to try to win the slightest improvement in wages or benefits; includes 22-year-old first-year female teacher, 5′ 3″ and 125 pounds, waving grade book in menacing fashion; also 58-year-old social worker, and grandmother, who hopes to safeguard her retirement (not to be confused with an unplugged granny.)

Founding Fathers: the fifty-five men who wrote the U. S. Constitution; who knew corporations were people, while also believing that an absolute commitment to freedom meant women, blacks and poor, white men didn’t actually need the right to vote; this group includes Alexander Hamilton, who originally argued in favor of monarchy.

Bill of Rights: list of inviolable rights, meant to protect angry conservatives who want to carry concealed weapons into bars, saunas, day care facilities and funeral parlors. Does not protect Americans who don’t want to be strip-searched when arrested for crimes as inconsequential as failing to carry a pooper scooper. Also: Muslims and others who look “different” are not covered.

liberal (also known as Nazi, fascist, socialist, communist): any person who has ever spoken out about any of the abuses of any large corporation, even when talking in his or her sleep; anyone who believes the average working-class American might be getting screwed; anyone a red-blooded American doesn’t agree with on any topic, including NASCAR; and anyone who denies that Charles and David Koch are captains of industry and infallible job creators.



Read more: http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/02/10/far-right-conservatives-invent-new-language-2/#ixzz2dbVV2LrA

Incidentally, Kaiser is a NON-PROFIT organization. Furthermore, when we were having a related discussion about this a few weeks ago, I called Kaiser to see if the Foundation had any particular feelings pro or con about ObamaCare. I got routed to the media people, spoke with a fellow, and he had no information about Kaiser taking any position whatsoever. Being political is not within their functions, seeing that they are NON-PROFIT and that there are regulations preventing a non-profit from engaging in politics.

I'm going to stay young forever.

Post ignored because it is incomprehensible.

M Woods 222's post ignored because it does not add anything substantive to the discussion.

I posted the URL to the report. If you want more than that, do the footwork yourself.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/08/30/gop-is-ignoring-the-will-of-the-people-in-efforts-to-defund-obamacare/

You are making an assumption here, aren't you ? The assumption is that Kaiser only polled its own members. I don't believe this is correct. Incidentally, Kaiser has at least 7 million members. Furthermore, I don't think the folks at Kaiser doing public polling are as stupid and naive about sample sizes and origins as you hope they were. I can see if I can find out -- but I bet that was a nationwide poll.

I think a year from now when the dust settled we will see what we will see and will be able to discuss matters better. I for one have Medicare and really like it. That will just be a part of the new ObamaCare, if I understand things right. It will work out well for me. And I think not having to pay medical costs for the huge amount of people who wait when sick until going to the emergency room become necessary is going to save a lot of money. We will see what we will see.

I agree. Universal coverage through Medicare would be my preferred answer to this, but of course many people get the heebeejeebies over this and scream "Socialism," as though socialists are some kind of monsters. Horse puckey.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2013/08/30/gop-is-ignoring-the-will-of-the-people-in-efforts-to-defund-obamacare/

One of the interesting things about a past pole is that the rightwing folks claim only a minority of Americans want ObamaCare. They claim the rest of Americans don't like it. This is a distortion. When you take into account the percentage of Americans who wanted A STRONGER OBAMACARE instead of what was passed, this swings the percentage of Americans who want ObamaCare in one form or another into the majority.

Anyway, it has been passed, it is going into effect, and we will have it. (Gloat, gloat, gloat)