Too many right-wingers in this forum?

[Kaninchen]

The whole “right wing” vs. “left wing” model of describing political positions & policies is inherently flawed.
Don’t believe it? Try this:
Please write a paper of at least 2500 words, but less than 25,000 words on the topic,“George Washington–the Political-Economic Child of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin”.
Get back to me, when its written. I’ll try not to die of old age in the meantime…

Hm - wouldn’t it require some kind of time-shift-disturbance for the essay title to work. In which case, perhaps you wouldn’t have been born, never mind die?

 

[surfinpure]

We have freedom. ‘Socialized’ healthcare and medicine are simply a free publicly funded option. Individuals are free to purchase health insurance and go to private hospitals, and free to send their children to private schools. Our governments do not own or control access to these things. This is misrepresentation, which sometimes seems like the only way the right can argue.

It is not freedom, cynic, when** the government is forcibly garnishing our wages in order to give others access to the same services free of charge.** It certainly is not freedom when we have to shell out a large chunk of our income for public schools to teach other children, and then shell out another large chunk for the private ones we select. And what about the poor? They don’t get to choose private school at all; it’s only for those who can afford to pay for both public and private who get to send their kids to private. Where’s the freedom in that?

The governments most certainly DO control access to these things. Point in case: If our taxes were not so high, my husband and I could afford the therapy for our brain-injured daughter that she so desperately needs. **But all that money is going into social programs for the government to distribute to other families as they see fit. ** Also, if our taxes were not so high (or if we even had school vouchers), we could afford to send my son to Catholic school, rather than the sewer that the public school has become.

Government’s job was never to educate us or provide healthcare. Government’s job is to protect FREEDOM. It is not Government’s business where I choose to send my children for school, or where we get our medical care. PERIOD.

 

[surfinpure]

A few years ago, when I had some surgery, I brought my own music to the operating room. I had assembled a collection of Weird Al parodies … “Like A Surgeon”, “Living with a Hernia”, and the like.

It caused a few startling situations. One surgeon started dancing with one of the nurses. We found in the discussion that followed that we were all Catholic … so there was a long discussion on Church politics. Followed by a long discussion on real estate (which doctors owned which medical office buildings) and scheduling issues for operating rooms.

The surgery was successful. We exited the operating room laughing and everybody talking at once. Much to the consternation of the next group waiting outside ready to roll in. You should have seen the strange looks we got.

All thanks to Weird Al.

[They asked if they could keep the tape. And later I got a report that they played it so often, that the tape wore out.]

My gosh! Even medical professionals?!

 

[Shoshana]

It is not freedom, cynic, when** the government is forcibly garnishing our wages in order to give others access to the same services free of charge.** It certainly is not freedom when we have to shell out a large chunk of our income for public schools to teach other children, and then shell out another large chunk for the private ones we select. And what about the poor? They don’t get to choose private school at all; it’s only for those who can afford to pay for both public and private who get to send their kids to private. Where’s the freedom in that?

The governments most certainly DO control access to these things. Point in case: If our taxes were not so high, my husband and I could afford the therapy for our brain-injured daughter that she so desperately needs. **But all that money is going into social programs for the government to distribute to other families as they see fit. **Also, if our taxes were not so high (or if we even had school vouchers), we could afford to send my son to Catholic school, rather than the sewer that the public school has become.

Government’s job was never to educate us or provide healthcare. Government’s job is to protect FREEDOM. It is not Government’s business where I choose to send my children for school, or where we get our medical care. PERIOD.

I am so sorry to hear about your daughter. May God bless her surf(name removed by moderator)ure. But i must say that your daughter would be taken care of here…but then…of course our taxes are way over the top.

 

[SoCalRC]

What is a “neoconservative”?

Please define “neoconservative”.

Thanks.

[These labels are very confusing.]

I normally do not cite wikipedia, but it is as good a starting point as any:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoconservative

It started as a derisive term, then was embraced by a group in the 60’s. But the modern meaning is probably best expressed by the Project for the New American Century (PNAC).

 

[surfinpure]

I am so sorry to hear about your daughter. May God bless her surf(name removed by moderator)ure. But i must say that your daughter would be taken care of here…but then…of course our taxes are way over the top.

I’m afraid that wouldn’t the be case. From what I know of the Canadian healthcare system, she would have to wait months to see a neurologist there.

And even if I’m mistaken about that, I would not want other people taxed to pay for my daughter’s care. That responsibility belongs to us. We own it, and we accept it. And the truth is, we could afford it, if we weren’t forced to hand over so much of our income to the Government’s programs.

I don’t believe in a style of government that treats the people like irresponsible children. It’s condescending and demeaning. We are grown-ups, and we can make grown-up decisions about our money. We don’t need Government telling us they know better than we do, and they ought to just take care of us. That’s not liberty; that’s slavery.

 

[Shoshana]

I’m afraid that wouldn’t the be case. From what I know of the Canadian healthcare system, she would have to wait months to see a neurologist there.

And even if I’m mistaken about that, I would not want other people taxed to pay for my daughter’s care. That responsibility belongs to us. We own it, and we accept it. And the truth is, we could afford it, if we weren’t forced to hand over so much of our income to the Government’s programs.

I don’t believe in a style of government that treats the people like irresponsible children. It’s condescending and demeaning. We are grown-ups, and we can make grown-up decisions about our money. We don’t need Government telling us they know better than we do, and they ought to just take care of us. That’s not liberty; that’s slavery.

I tend to agree with you here. Especially the welfare system, where it should be a transitory system, becomes a life-style for many. My ex-BIL goes on welfare when he knows he has to pay child support for 3 out of 4 children. My sister is wearing herself out with so many jobs just to keep up with her bills. I have written to our local MPP about this scoundrel’s way of living. Now Revenue Canada has him red-flagged. He has used and abused the welfare system and knows how to do it also.

 

[surfinpure]

I tend to agree with you here. Especially the welfare system, where it should be a transitory system, becomes a life-style for many. My ex-BIL goes on welfare when he knows he has to pay child support for 3 out of 4 children. My sister is wearing herself out with so many jobs just to keep up with her bills. I have written to our local MPP about this scoundrel’s way of living. Now Revenue Canada has him red-flagged. He has used and abused the welfare system and knows how to do it also.

I could go on and on about the families I’ve known who were literally ruined by the “welfare mentality.” If you look at it from that side of the coin, these people are not being done a service. They are being given everything in life, and they never learn how to take responsibility for themselves. They develop a strong sense of entitlement, and it is encouraged by socialist politicians who tell them they “deserve” all of these things and ought to “demand” them.

A loving parent does not spoil his children, but teaches them to grow and take responsibility, because that’s the natural way to survive and thrive in this life. But an overindulgent parent does everything for his children, and even takes all the responsibility for their wrongs. The result? They remain children the rest of their lives. We’ve all known people like this. It is a great disservice to a human being to teach him that he ought to expect everything to be given him, and he ought never to do the work for himself or own up to his own actions. This is not love.

 

[pnewton]

Because I take them seriously, yes. It might seem odd to you, since you have already stated that you not only disagree with Rome on some teachings, you challenge the Pope’s authority to even make them. Also, you have previously stated that even compromises on abortion and euthanasia are acceptable to you.

FYI - For anyone reading, what this poster says is totally false. I have never said compromises on abortion and euthanasia are acceptable. Either he/she is a liar or a poor reasoner. As a good, faithful Catholic, I also consider this to be slander.

I have never challenged the Pope’s authority to make any statement, even on soccer.

 

[pnewton]

The governments most certainly DO control access to these things. Point in case: If our taxes were not so high, my husband and I could afford the therapy for our brain-injured daughter that she so desperately needs. **But all that money is going into social programs for the government to distribute to other families as they see fit. **Also, if our taxes were not so high (or if we even had school vouchers), we could afford to send my son to Catholic school, rather than the sewer that the public school has become.

I am sorry to here of your daughter. I wonder how many people out there like you who have been made to give, give, give until you reach the breaking point. The takers of benefits and welfare may drain the well dry one day. Then we will truly see class conflict between the working class and the idle poor.

 

[SoCalRC]

Government’s job was never to educate us or provide healthcare. Government’s job is to protect FREEDOM. It is not Government’s business where I choose to send my children for school, or where we get our medical care. PERIOD.

The United States was/is unique in its attempt to form a universal public education system. The strong belief, which I happen to agree with, is that self rule requires informed citizens.

All my children but one went through Catholic school up through high school, but I never felt ‘cheated’ that I was paying taxes for public education while then paying for private education.

My son, who is severely disabled, was unfortunate to be born in a less enlightened time. We were fortunately in that we had the means to pay for treatments and services. It would have been easy to leave it at that. Just because we could afford, say $100,000 a year for his care, does not mean that it was/is easy. We were adament about home care when institutionalization was the norm, and also have been adament that he have opportunitites to belong to the community.

But always in the back of our minds has been the thought, what if we were as poor now and when I was growing up? What about those other children. So we have spent a lot of time and money pushing and supporting things like IDEA. I am not proposing that the system is perfect, it is not. But it has been a tremendous step forward. Community based care is significantly cheaper for society as a whole, and offers dramatically better quality of life for many of the disabled. The principle problem is that it is only partially funded, which creates a unfair burden on school districts for what is a societal medical/care for our weakest members, issue.

I also have been a big proponent of the ADA, primarily because of my experiences in Vietnam, and then remaining involved with injured vets since. And I’ve pushed and pushed for everything from mass transit reform to social security waivers. Rather it is my wheel chair vet neighbor, or the developmentally disabled people I employ as messengers and custodians, my experience is that these people want to work, they want to be productive, and they want feel like they are contributing to the greater good.

With no disregard to your pain, try to hear what you are saying through my ears. You are saying, if you just didn’t have to pay taxes, you’d have enough to get by. The implication seems to be, why should I help people with less? I get more, why can’t they?

Now, the reality is that only a very small percentage of your taxes goes to other families dealing with disabilities or medical problems. But let’s ignore that. How would it sound if I said - what’s your problem? Just make a lot more money - I started in a house with no indoor plumbing and I paid for my son’s care out of my pocket while paying massive taxes…

A fair number of people on these forums don’t have any problem with that sort of thinking. The logic is, I am wealthy because I deserve it, it’s mine, I earned it… But I do have a problem with it. If I had just the slightest change, say being born black in Baltimore, there is an excellent chance I would be in a very different place today.

Now, consider your daughter. I don’t know the circumstances, but I am pretty certain that neither your or your spouse legitimately plans on living forever. What are the chances that she will be Bill Gates? What are the chances that you will be able to leave a massive trust fund to care for her? (No disrepspect, but if taxes are constraining your obtaining care, it seems reasonable to assume, that like many families, you are just keeping your head above water.)

I feel, strongly, that people like your daughter are equal children of God. The fact that they may lead unconventional lives does not mean that they cannot be worthwhile human beings. In fact, the standards we normally measure ourselves by are pretty worthless. I wish I had half the courage of many of the disabled individuals I know.

And I also think that a society is best judged by how it treats its weakest members. We ‘haves’ always get an easy ride. Think about it, in threads here I’ve had people wail about the estate tax as a grave injustice - even though most will never pay it. I may pay it (it is phasing out now, but we’ll see), and don’t have a problem at all. A couple like us is exempted millions, and you can tax shelter quite a bit more. Gift laws let us move what would be serious wealth by most American’s standards while we are still kicking. And, in the end, it ends up being mostly a tax on unrealized capitol gains. The estate tax didn’t seem to stop Paris Hilton from having a wealthy, shallow (at least so far) life, but let’s ring our hands.

On the flip side, I know a nice young man named R.H. He gets up at 4:00 am because it takes hours for him to ride the bus to work. He bags groceries at a super market. He is physically and mentally disabled, so he has to limit his hours lest he loses his social security benefits (his medical costs remain significant). He hates sitting around, so he volunteers the other days each week at the homeless shelter about 10 miles from my house - and we’re worried about Paris Hilton’s inheritance situation.

So, while I am sorry about your situation, and I respect your thoughts about a laisse fair society, I just can’t fathom the idea that in the wealthiest nation on earth - in all of human history, we have children going to bed hungry, disabled vets wihtout homes, and people like R.H., who we try to rob of a sense of self worth even as we just allow him to live at roughly the poverty line.

 

[SoCalRC]

FYI - For anyone reading, what this poster says is totally false. I have never said compromises on abortion and euthanasia are acceptable. Either he/she is a liar or a poor reasoner. As a good, faithful Catholic, I also consider this to be slander.

I have never challenged the Pope’s authority to make any statement, even on soccer.

I can only hold you accountable to what you say. You not only reject the Church’s position on the death penalty, you have repeatedly contended that the Pope’s instructions are not binding on you because it is ‘beyond his authority’.

With regards to compromise, you have supported the GOP’s position on the issues, which are, most assuredly compromises (Bush even federally funds stem cell research).

You have repeatedly made false claims and baseless stereotypes about me, so it seems odd that you would be crying foul for being simply held accountable to your own statements. But, I guess it is to be expected.

 

[surfinpure]

The United States was/is unique in its attempt to form a universal public education system. The strong belief, which I happen to agree with, is that self rule requires informed citizens.

Informing citizens is one thing, but setting up a government mandated, taxation-based “education” system which holds a major monopoly and penalizes those who do not wish to be indoctrinated is quite another.

All my children but one went through Catholic school up through high school, but I never felt ‘cheated’ that I was paying taxes for public education while then paying for private education.

You may not. I do. I would much rather, if my money is to be forcibly taken from me for the purposes of educating my children, that I at least be allowed to choose where it goes.

My son, who is severely disabled, was unfortunate to be born in a less enlightened time. We were fortunately in that we had the means to pay for treatments and services. It would have been easy to leave it at that. Just because we could afford, say $100,000 a year for his care, does not mean that it was/is easy. We were adament about home care when institutionalization was the norm, and also have been adament that he have opportunitites to belong to the community.

I am very sorry for your son. I am also sorry for the exorbitant cost of medical care. Perhaps if healthcare became competitive, as it is just beginning to do in the private sector, we would see costs go down. It is nice to have choices, though, isn’t it? Rather than the government telling you you have to place your son in one setting or another, because that is what they think you need. This is what socialized medicine will bring us.

But always in the back of our minds has been the thought, what if we were as poor now and when I was growing up? What about those other children. So we have spent a lot of time and money pushing and supporting things like IDEA. I am not proposing that the system is perfect, it is not. But it has been a tremendous step forward. Community based care is significantly cheaper for society as a whole, and offers dramatically better quality of life for many of the disabled.

I’m not at all certain about that.

The principle problem is that it is only partially funded, which creates a unfair burden on school districts for what is a societal medical/care for our weakest members, issue.

If we didn’t have school districts, which absorb thousands of individuals’ tax dollars every year, perhaps our weakest members could receive better care. When did it become the school’s responsibility to care for the disabled? The solution is not throwing more money at the schools (Lord knows they would love that); it’s allowing the citizens to decide where their money is going to go.

I also have been a big proponent of the ADA, primarily because of my experiences in Vietnam, and then remaining involved with injured vets since. And I’ve pushed and pushed for everything from mass transit reform to social security waivers. Rather it is my wheel chair vet neighbor, or the developmentally disabled people I employ as messengers and custodians, my experience is that these people want to work, they want to be productive, and they want feel like they are contributing to the greater good.

With no disregard to your pain, try to hear what you are saying through my ears. You are saying, if you just didn’t have to pay taxes, you’d have enough to get by. The implication seems to be, why should I help people with less? I get more, why can’t they?

I’m sorry that is the inference. It is not what I have implied. I don’t get more. I get less, because I am forced to “give.” Giving is not giving when the “gift” is taken from you. If what you mean is I “earn” more than some (though not many), then yes. We work very hard for what we have. We have made sacrifices and good decisions, and God has been good to us. I have nothing at all against charity! I have a good bit to say about robbery, however.

Now, the reality is that only a very small percentage of your taxes goes to other families dealing with disabilities or medical problems. But let’s ignore that. How would it sound if I said - what’s your problem? Just make a lot more money - I started in a house with no indoor plumbing and I paid for my son’s care out of my pocket while paying massive taxes…

It sounds logical to me. Especially if you tacked on, “And go seek help from local charities and benefactors, who can observe your lifestyle and see that the money will truly be put to its proper use – helping your needy child – rather than spent on big-screen TVs and crack, the way some irresponsible people would spend it.”

(to be continued…)

 

[surfinpure]

(continued from last post)

A fair number of people on these forums don’t have any problem with that sort of thinking. The logic is, I am wealthy because I deserve it, it’s mine, I earned it… But I do have a problem with it. If I had just the slightest change, say being born black in Baltimore, there is an excellent chance I would be in a very different place today.

I will give you the benefit of the doubt for a moment and say that you have actually read other posters writing those words. I never have, but perhaps we “travel” in different forum circles. So say that’s true. You seem to imply that it is selfish to claim a right to what we have earned, at least insofar as we put it to use for our legitimate needs. I never take for granted any gift that comes from God, even the ones he has chosen to give through our own labor. How dare anyone presume to know my heart (implying that I am selfish or greedy), and how can anyone presume to tell me the best use for my resources, whatever they be? There is a worthwhile book (though Protestant in context) called Boundaries, by Dr. Henry Cloud. You ought to pick it up and see what he has to say about stewardship.

Now, consider your daughter. I don’t know the circumstances, but I am pretty certain that neither your or your spouse legitimately plans on living forever. What are the chances that she will be Bill Gates? What are the chances that you will be able to leave a massive trust fund to care for her? (No disrepspect, but if taxes are constraining your obtaining care, it seems reasonable to assume, that like many families, you are just keeping your head above water.)

I feel, strongly, that people like your daughter are equal children of God. The fact that they may lead unconventional lives does not mean that they cannot be worthwhile human beings. In fact, the standards we normally measure ourselves by are pretty worthless. I wish I had half the courage of many of the disabled individuals I know.

Yes, we are barely keeping our heads above water. No, we have no delusions of immortality. Yes, I sincerely hope she will be provided for in the future. But I would never in my lifetime, so help me God, dream of asking the government to forcibly take money from other citizens in order to provide for my daughter. My morality is not circumstantial. At the risk of her having to do without the best care, I will put my trust in God, make wise financial decisions, and build a social network for my daughter so that she will never have to be in need after I am gone. It is fallacious to presume that people have no resources but government handouts. Yes, people find themselves in unfortunate situations, but **so long as the Catholic Church exists on this earth, I will never fear for any child of mine living in abject poverty. **The love of God’s people is great, my friend, and it is enough to carry the weakest members of our society.

And I also think that a society is best judged by how it treats its weakest members. We ‘haves’ always get an easy ride. Think about it, in threads here I’ve had people wail about the estate tax as a grave injustice - even though most will never pay it. I may pay it (it is phasing out now, but we’ll see), and don’t have a problem at all. A couple like us is exempted millions, and you can tax shelter quite a bit more. Gift laws let us move what would be serious wealth by most American’s standards while we are still kicking. And, in the end, it ends up being mostly a tax on unrealized capitol gains. The estate tax didn’t seem to stop Paris Hilton from having a wealthy, shallow (at least so far) life, but let’s ring our hands.

I don’t even have time to go into the abominable estate tax right now, so I will simply say that you and I are miles apart on this issue.

On the flip side, I know a nice young man named R.H. He gets up at 4:00 am because it takes hours for him to ride the bus to work. He bags groceries at a super market. He is physically and mentally disabled, so he has to limit his hours lest he loses his social security benefits (his medical costs remain significant). He hates sitting around, so he volunteers the other days each week at the homeless shelter about 10 miles from my house - and we’re worried about Paris Hilton’s inheritance situation.

Guess what invaluable thing R.H. has that many well-bodied welfare recipients do not … he has self-respect.

So, while I am sorry about your situation, and I respect your thoughts about a laisse fair society, I just can’t fathom the idea that in the wealthiest nation on earth - in all of human history, we have children going to bed hungry, disabled vets wihtout homes, and people like R.H., who we try to rob of a sense of self worth even as we just allow him to live at roughly the poverty line.

I am as upset about this as you are, SoCal, but I envision a much different solution to the problem. It begins with responsibility. The needy are not the responsibility of government. They are the responsibility of the Church. You would see much more charity in this world if people did not feel they were being scalped by a greedy, mismanaged, irresponsible, patronizing government.

 

[pnewton]

The needy are not the responsibility of government. They are the responsibility of the Church. You would see much more charity in this world if people did not feel they were being scalped by a greedy, mismanaged, irresponsible, patronizing government.

I think this is one big difference in viewpoints. One side says that we must help the poor, so I will take from others and help the poor. The other side says that we must help the poor, so I will give of my money and help the poor.

 

[SoCalRC]

Yes, we are barely keeping our heads above water. No, we have no delusions of immortality. Yes, I sincerely hope she will be provided for in the future. But I would never in my lifetime, so help me God, dream of asking the government to forcibly take money from other citizens in order to provide for my daughter. My morality is not circumstantial. At the risk of her having to do without the best care, I will put my trust in God, make wise financial decisions, and build a social network for my daughter so that she will never have to be in need after I am gone. It is fallacious to presume that people have no resources but government handouts. Yes, people find themselves in unfortunate situations, but **so long as the Catholic Church exists on this earth, I will never fear for any child of mine living in abject poverty. **The love of God’s people is great, my friend, and it is enough to carry the weakest members of our society.

Something to keep in mind is that we pay more for health care than any other industrized nation on earth. A nickel out of every dollar generated in the US economy goes to health care administration. But spending is the only thing we lead in. In terms of outcome and access to care, we are pretty much dead last.

It comes down to efficiency. Trying to help charitably one by one, direct, is rewarding, but not very cost effective. If I paid for some surgical procedure for your daughter, I would have zero bargaining power with the hospital. But when I help create an entity that works on a boarder scale, more options for cost control become open to me.

At some point we will have to decide if a particular ideology is more important than tangible results. The way I see it, we have the worst of both worlds now. We have the most expensive patients on socialized, single payer health care, propping up a spectacularly inefficient private system that now rations care at an alarming rate. In the long run, I think it hurts our competitiveness in the global economy (I was just looking at how much health care cost is burdened in every US auto sold abroad the other day).

But we can agree to disagree. As one parent speaking to another, I figure you can respect that my concern is, specifically, for people like your daughter. When self constructed safety nets fail, I still want them to have an opportunity to reach their maximum potential as human persons, not be discarded or neglected. I believe that some of this must be accomplished at the societal level (if the disabled can’t get to work because they can’t drive, or we continue to give tax incentives for sending low skill jobs abroad, how can they contribute?) But, again, we can agree to disagree.

Peace

 

[SoCalRC]

I think this is one big difference in viewpoints. One side says that we must help the poor, so I will take from others and help the poor. The other side says that we must help the poor, so I will give of my money and help the poor.

I don’t see it as either/or. We certainly give a non trivial amount to charity. But that does not mean that poverty is not a societal problem. We control monetary policy. When the economy heats up, we tighten up rates to stop inflation. We do this for the common good, to try to dampen the normal economic ‘cycles’. But a side effect of ‘dampening booms’ is that we hold unemployement artificially higher for a period of time. That is, we curtail the sharing of the weath at the bottom of the economic ladder for the greater common good.

This is just one example, there are many. Public policy and poverty are not wholly detached from each other. So there is a reasonable question as to rather, in pursuing policies that benefit the bulk of citizens, do we, as a society, have a moral obligation to those said policies most hurt?

What I find interesting is that there is a lot of resentment towards the ‘have nots’. They are lazy, they are taking from me… But our social safety net is just a modest part of our spending. The vast bulk of public spending, and public policy, goes to benefit ‘haves’. Consider this irony. We (my wife and I) helped initially fund a group to provide soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan with helmet liners and body armor. While we were privately buying armor, the government handed out $280B in no-bid contracts, which the GAO says have not been completed, or can even properly be accounted for. Massive amounts of tax dollars going for services never provided, or tainted water and tained food, while body armor becomes a gift of private charity.

I see lots of people angry at ‘welfare queens’, whom I really have never met, and I’ve spent a lot of time at some of our poorest parishes here in the southland. But surprisingly little rage at rich politicians funneling massive amounts of money to their weathy friends and donors. Weirder still, the media now seems to treat corruption as a partisan issue. I would think that every American would have a stake in honest, responsible governance.

 

[surfinpure]

SoCal,

Yes, we will agree to disagree here. We both want the very best for those among us who have great need; we simply disagree about the nature of the problem and the methods by which we would solve it. It is because of their care for the poor that I respect my more “liberal” friends and family. Very good hearts, just different ideas.
:tiphat:

Peace to you,

Mary

 

[Stratiotes]

From my point of view, the difference between republican and democrat is like the difference between Leninists and Trotskyites. Whichever you vote for, you get a socialist – and this election seems to be shaping up to prove that point. It is only a matter of difference in degree and not a difference of any significance. There is no “lesser of two evils” no matter what anybody tries to tell you. Their actions never match their rhetoric so don’t bother trying to figure out which one is less evil based on whatever they say. Because they’re only saying what they think will motivate their core-constituents to vote and not saying what they actually plan to do. They are playing the American people for fools and I wish yall would stop encouraging them by giving them your votes. Vote for a third party or something – but stop feeding the false two-party monster. I know the old excuse – “But a third party can’t win!” Yeah, well, you don’t win by voting for the same old thing again and again either.

 

[KathleenElsie]

Maybe I don’t know what I am. LOL

Pro-life: all life from conception to natural death

Social needs should be from the person not the government in most cases. Social services only for those that can not do for themselves not for those that won’t do for themselves.

Health care needs to be regulated so everyone can afford the basics. Private insurance for elective stuff. You want it you pay for it.

Education freedom to send a child to whatever school I as a parent find appropriate. Home schooling as an option with costs also being covered just as if in a private school.

Flat tax % on purchases only. The more you spend the more you pay. More personal (name removed by moderator)ut into where the money government collects goes to.

Support local store owners and workers.

Care for the earth as if God created it.

Immigration for those that want to work and follow our laws.

Secure borders. Go after the drugs and gangs that wish to do us harm.

No religious regulations freedom of speech and practice. (no human sacrifice or physical harm to others allowed) Words might hurt but everyone has the freedom to say them.

So what am I?