Political Discussion

wokeupnew said:
Do people voting for Pete and Amy know that they don't support Medicare for All????? like.... why would you support a candidate like that?
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Because people don't understand what Medicare for All really means and they have been conditioned to believe that government run programs are doomed to failure or at a minimum be not done very well. btw there is ample evidence to support those thoughts and opinions.

This is also a failure on the part of the people who are advocating for these programs / policies. Policies I support btw. This has been defined as "socialized medicine." Socialized anything is a very scary term to the average person. The average person has been averagely taught to averagely think and averagely consider average narratives about what social programs are and do. Most people conflate communist regimes and social principles. It. Is. Frightening. to many many people.

That fear is something that many of us "progressives" ignore. We tend to consider people who are fearful as less than, under-educated, dumb even. Those attitudes are shaming and have dramatically limited progressive policies in the U.S. I believe these attitudes drove some of the "disaffected" Americans to get on team MAGA.

It would serve everyone (including myself and the Sanders campaign )if we approached the fearful and unconvinced with compassion instead of an assumption that their ignorance is bliss and by choice.

The argument that "it's the right thing to do," even if it is, is not persuasive and is really not persuasive if it is attached to a "with us or against us attitude." Buttigiege and Klobochar are profiting off of that attitude and it makes their electability arguments much more convincing to the people that are fearful of social principles and ideas.
 
jaycee said:
Because people don't understand what Medicare for All really means and they have been conditioned to believe that government run programs are doomed to failure or at a minimum be not done very well. btw there is ample evidence to support those thoughts and opinions.

This is also a failure on the part of the people who are advocating for these programs / policies. Policies I support btw. This has been defined as "socialized medicine." Socialized anything is a very scary term to the average person. The average person has been averagely taught to averagely think and averagely consider average narratives about what social programs are and do. Most people conflate communist regimes and social principles. It. Is. Frightening. to many many people.

That fear is something that many of us "progressives" ignore. We tend to consider people who are fearful as less than, under-educated, dumb even. Those attitudes are shaming and have dramatically limited progressive policies in the U.S. I believe these attitudes drove some of the "disaffected" Americans to get on team MAGA.

It would serve everyone (including myself and the Sanders campaign )if we approached the fearful and unconvinced with compassion instead of an assumption that their ignorance is bliss and by choice.

The argument that "it's the right thing to do," even if it is, is not persuasive and is really not persuasive if it is attached to a "with us or against us attitude." Buttigiege and Klobochar are profiting off of that attitude and it makes their electability arguments much more convincing to the people that are fearful of social principles and ideas.
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Most of the people that say they don't want to pay for other people's healthcare don't realize that that's exactly what group health insurance is. Ever see insurance rates at companies with an older average age of employees?

Oh, and you're not only paying for other people's healthcare you're paying profits to a 3rd party.
 
dbarila said:
Most of the people that say they don't want to pay for other people's healthcare don't realize that that's exactly what group health insurance is. Ever see insurance rates at companies with an older average age of employees?

Oh, and you're not only paying for other people's healthcare you're paying profits to a 3rd party.
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Yes. People are misinformed. I think I stated that pretty clearly in my post.

Of course, eliminating capitalistic profiteering from something that is a human right is the best thing to do for the most people.

But my post was about how their misinformation is weaponized by the left specifically. It's of course weaponized by every political angle.
Maybe instead of focusing on convincing people of how wrong they are there's a smarter way to engage people to gain their support of social ideals?

What I'm getting at is that a candidate or party or whatever political entity being factually correct about an issue and what to do about it has very little bearing on getting people who are misinformed and fearful of drastic change to support those changes. People make decisions based on emotion and feeling far more than with facts and logic.... and my facts and logic are not your facts and logic and vice versa.

If we (progressive people) approach people who differ in their logic with disdain or vitriol first there is almost zero chance that they will ever support the policies that we are so very sure would make all of our lives better.
 
Any thoughts on the possibility of a contested convention? I know a lot of people have said they will vote for whomever gets nominated, but I imagine many will be turned off if the DNC decides to take the nom away from Bernie
fivethirtyeight.com

Sanders Is The Front-Runner After New Hampshire, And A Contested Convention Has Become More Likely

The Democratic primary is in a confusing state at the moment. And our forecast model is a little confused, also. It’s making a couple of assumptions about how t…
fivethirtyeight.com fivethirtyeight.com
 
Jdiddlydawg said:
Any thoughts on the possibility of a contested convention? I know a lot of people have said they will vote for whomever gets nominated, but I imagine many will be turned off if the DNC decides to take the nom away from Bernie
fivethirtyeight.com

Sanders Is The Front-Runner After New Hampshire, And A Contested Convention Has Become More Likely

The Democratic primary is in a confusing state at the moment. And our forecast model is a little confused, also. It’s making a couple of assumptions about how t…
fivethirtyeight.com fivethirtyeight.com
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My priorities will be 1. Get Trump out 2. Fix the DNC.
 
Lee Newman said:
Honestly, I’m not sure we can get Trump out as long as the DNC is this fucked up.
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We're all obviously in tune with politics in this thread, but honestly I don't think the average voter understands what's going on with the DNC, or frankly even really cares. I was talking to my mother in law this morning, who is a Demicrat and I had to explain a lot of stuff to her about the primary that I take for granted that people just know.
 
Jdiddlydawg said:
I imagine many will be turned off if the DNC decides to take the nom away from Bernie
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I'll be voting for Sanders in my state's primary, but there are remaining candidates I would vote for in the general if they deservedly win the nomination. Last cycle I wanted Sanders, but still voted for Clinton in the general (somewhat reluctantly).

Honestly, if the DNC decides to 'steal' the nom, I think I'm leaning toward not voting for president, but it will obviously depend on how the race goes. I live in a state where I think it will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for any of the dem candidates to win, so I don't believe it really matters who I vote for outside of the primary.
 
Jdiddlydawg said:
Any thoughts on the possibility of a contested convention? I know a lot of people have said they will vote for whomever gets nominated, but I imagine many will be turned off if the DNC decides to take the nom away from Bernie
fivethirtyeight.com

Sanders Is The Front-Runner After New Hampshire, And A Contested Convention Has Become More Likely

The Democratic primary is in a confusing state at the moment. And our forecast model is a little confused, also. It’s making a couple of assumptions about how t…
fivethirtyeight.com fivethirtyeight.com
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Bernie will win
Jorduck said:
I'll be voting for Sanders in my state's primary, but there are remaining candidates I would vote for in the general if they deservedly win the nomination. Last cycle I wanted Sanders, but still voted for Clinton in the general (somewhat reluctantly).

Honestly, if the DNC decides to 'steal' the nom, I think I'm leaning toward not voting for president, but it will obviously depend on how the race goes. I live in a state where I think it will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, for any of the dem candidates to win, so I don't believe it really matters who I vote for outside of the primary.
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I live in a very blue state so my vote President won't matter, however I'll probably still vote for whomever it is no matter what
 
Just saw a story on the state of our healthcare system on NBC Nightly News.

1 in 7 Americans is struggling with crushing medical debt.


A growing trend in recent years is for Hospitals to sue patients and garnish wages. Today, 36% of the hospitals in the United States are now aggressively suing patients and garnishing wages to collect debt.


NBC reached out to the CEO of a Non-profit Hospital System in New Jersey that is aggressively suing patients and garnishing wages for comment. They made a note that the CEO makes a salary of 2.1 Million a year.

The CEO did respond to NBC request and deflecting the blame / pointed the blame at the insurance companies stating the issue is ever higher deductible and less services covered.

Then he listed how much charity the hospital system does and was like look how good we are.
 
jaycee said:
We all knew this already. Right?

www.theatlantic.com

The Great Affordability Crisis Breaking America

In one of the best decades the American economy has ever recorded, families were bled dry.
www.theatlantic.com www.theatlantic.com
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I really feel it in housing and child care. We've had to juggle those two costs, having to choose between one or the other. We chose a house with childcare taking a back seat. His grandmother takes care of him 3-4 days a week. We pay her a little bit to make up for the house cleaning gigs she is not able to take. Would we have liked for him to be in preschool (of course) but the prices on that are disgusting. We would not be able to pay our mortgage. It's been rough on my wife having to do a full time job in three days rather than the regular 5. He goes into TK next fall. I'm looking forward to getting a little more financial freedom, but I'm afraid that money may just get folded into more payments.
 
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Dtknuckles said:
I really feel it in housing and child care. We've had to juggle those two costs, having to choose between one or the other. We chose a house with childcare taking a back seat. His grandmother takes care of him 3-4 days a week. We pay her a little bit to make up for the house cleaning gigs she is not able to take. Would we have liked for him to be in preschool (of course) but the prices on that are disgusting. We would not be able to pay our mortgage. It's been rough on my wife having to do a full time job in three days rather than the regular 5. He goes into TK next fall. I'm looking forward to getting a little more financial freedom, but I'm afraid that money may just get folded into more payments.
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my girlfriend doesn't want kids, and I'm okay with that. I never felt strongly either way. But, if she did, I don't think we'd consider having kids because the cost of kids is insane already. If it was easier for people to have children maybe it would be more of an option for people to do. But some people (millennials) because they can't afford it.
 
wokeupnew said:
my girlfriend doesn't want kids, and I'm okay with that. I never felt strongly either way. But, if she did, I don't think we'd consider having kids because the cost of kids is insane already. If it was easier for people to have children maybe it would be more of an option for people to do. But some people (millennials) because they can't afford it.
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When we has both are kids we had a $10,000+ hospital bill AFTER insurance. Normal birth, no complications. It's insane. The same people who say that the younger generation just needs to work harder are the same ones that had $0 hospital bills when they had kids.
 
The cost of birthing is nothing compared to actually raising them. At any rate, healthcare seems to continue to be the biggest expenditure. I am in constant medical debt over things like surgical extractions of things shoved up noses or dental work and I am only 5 years in.
 
debianlinux said:
The cost of birthing is nothing compared to actually raising them. At any rate, healthcare seems to continue to be the biggest expenditure. I am in constant medical debt over things like surgical extractions of things shoved up noses or dental work and I am only 5 years in.
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Can't say I've ever had to deal with a surgical extraction but definitely been there on dental work. Also, one time they did a flu test on my oldest that I had to drive over to the lab, came back positive so they suggested I get the youngest test, again drove the test myself over to the lab. 2 weeks later a nice $800 bill for 2 flu tests.
 
dbarila said:
Can't say I've ever had to deal with a surgical extraction but definitely been there on dental work. Also, one time they did a flu test on my oldest that I had to drive over to the lab, came back positive so they suggested I get the youngest test, again drove the test myself over to the lab. 2 weeks later a nice $800 bill for 2 flu tests.
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God forbid you buy the Tamiflu... just went through that about 3 weeks ago. I accrue medical debt faster than I can pay it off. I am servicing the debt at an average rate of around $350 a month but it grows by about $100/mo meaning to stay on top of everything I would need to budget $500 a month just for healthcare not accounting for what I spend on insurance premiums. Interestingly enough this works out to roughly what my goddamn deductible is.
 


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I can't believe that's the hill that Pete's going to die on
 
dbarila said:
When we has both are kids we had a $10,000+ hospital bill AFTER insurance. Normal birth, no complications. It's insane. The same people who say that the younger generation just needs to work harder are the same ones that had $0 hospital bills when they had kids.
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One of my co-workers recently gave birth, and after insurance, with the best of the 4 plans our company offers she owed $13,000+.

And that is a normal birth, no complications. It's just astounding and unsustainable.
 
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