It is not an insult to the person, but to the question. It is like, “when are you going to stop beating your wife.” If a question, by its nature, assumes as fact things that are not fact, it is not a valid question. If simple logic is insulting, I am not the one doing the insulting.
I noticed that this week Christianity Today had a different take on President Trump, thinking him morally unfit. I believe this may be the first evangelical voice I have heard point out what I thought to be quite obvious.
They had enough votes to pass ACA on partisan lines. It’s their fault for writing bad legislation (ACA).
There were 58 Democrats in the Senate (59 if you count Bernie Sanders). Because of the Republican filibuster, 60 votes were required to pass it. Given that 59 is less than 60, how did they have enough to pass it on partisan lines?JSRG:
They had enough votes to pass ACA on partisan lines. It’s their fault for writing bad legislation (ACA).
And to be clear, it was bad legislation because they allowed it to be written by special interests.
Same way they passed ACA
But it wasn’t passed on partisan lines. As I noted, they had to enlist the help of an Independent who rejected the things that it was claimed Democrats had the numbers to pass! It’s nonsensical to say that the Democrats could have gone further with the numbers they had when they didn’t have the number of Democrats required and thus had to compromise to enlist the necessary help of someone outside of the party.JSRG:
Same way they passed ACA
The Senate Dems had 60 seats when they passed ACA
The Democrats had 58 seats–59 if you’re willing to count Bernie Sanders, who effectively is a Democrat. They didn’t have 60. That’s the whole point.JSRG:
The Senate Dems had 60 seats when they passed ACA
Democrat Paul Kirk was appointed interim senator from Massachusetts, once again giving the Democrats that 60th vote. That’s called a supermajority which beats a filibuster.
You’re right, they did pass it with 60 votes. But, as I keep pointing out, one of those votes (the 60th) was Lieberman, who wasn’t a Democrat and forced the Democrats to scale their ideas back in order to get his vote. So trying to claim that there were enough Democrats to pass a more expansive healthcare law, as was claimed, is clearly incorrect.JSRG:
Democrat Paul Kirk was appointed interim senator from Massachusetts, once again giving the Democrats that 60th vote. That’s called a supermajority which beats a filibuster.
The Senate passed ACA on Christmas Eve 2009 in a 60 – 39 vote
And also voted with the Republicans a decent amount. He was an Independent, of course you’re going to be voting some with either party. He leaned more Democrat than Conservative as an Independent but to classify him as a Democrat at the time of the ACA seems erroneous.
Even if true, and this is unclear, that doesn’t change the fact that, contrary to the claim made, there weren’t enough Democrats to pass the bill past the filibuster anyway, because there weren’t 60 elected Democrats.
Bottom line is they had no GOP support, for ACA or universal care.
What does this have to do with the claim that there were enough Democrats to pass the law–which is blatantly untrue? That is the claim I was refuting.JSRG:
Bottom line is they had no GOP support, for ACA or universal care.
They wrote and passed the law they wanted passed,
How did it not water down their efforts? If not for the Republicans invoking the filibuster, ACA proponents would have needed only 51 votes–thus most likely allowing for a more expansive bill. But the Republicans played hardball, raising the requirement to 60 votes, thereby forcing the Democrats to go outside the party to get the necessary votes, resulting in various ideas being rejected. The “GOP resistance” absolutely watered down their efforts.
You might consider speaking for yourself, as Trump did for himself, and perhaps the people you know.
Trump’s candor seems to represent an unabashed value of vice over virtue.
That’s reasonable but if we are looking for virtue, where is it? I wouldn’t isolate one statement or one act. There are many things that comprise a person. He helped put on a Veterans’ Day parade I believe one year. I’d take the human being as a whole. At least that “vice” isn’t ingrained in the GOP platform. If one judges, they can be judged themselves but I don’t care to go off topic. Honesty is still a virtue. I’d also look to the low unemployment rates we are seeing for minorities in this country versus strife.