Real Doctors, Fake Notes
Either Andrew Breitbart controls the entire media complex or Crooks & Liars jumped the gun. "Figure it out."
One of the interesting side stories emerging from the Wisconsin protests is the tale of a number of doctors handing out potentially fraudulent notes to protesters who called in sick to be present. Despite first-hand reporting (and video) from people on the ground, Crooks & Liars attempts to undermine it with a classic ad hominem. Drawing tenuous connections between Andrew Breitbart and a website that posted a video of fake doctors notes being given out is sufficient in their minds to dispel the entire issue:
So we’re clear on this, Christian Hartsock, the guy “interviewed” and also the guy who probably produced that first video is the same guy who helped out with the smears of ACORN and New Jersey teachers, and he works for Andrew Breitbart.
Breitbart has bragged about being at the protests in Wisconsin today. Americans for Prosperity is linked to the MacIver Institute. A Breitbart video smear guy is quoted in an article smearing teachers. Figure it out.
There’s not a single fact offered in the piece that actually goes to the truth or falsity of the central questions raised: Is the doctor in the video posted at MacIver Institute real and is he handing out ethically questionable notes to protesters? Rather, in classic form, a series of guilt by association premises is offered, culminating in the conclusory, “Figure it out.”
Well, if Breitbart (who got diagnosed with “walker pneumonia” at one of these stations) is that powerful, they may as well give up now; because his tentacles now reach all the way up to the Associated Press:
The University of Wisconsin medical school says it’s investigating reports that doctors from the school handed out medical excuse notes to protesters at the state Capitol this weekend.
Doctors from numerous hospitals set up a station near the Capitol on Saturday to provide notes to explain public employees’ absences from work. One of those doctors was Lou Sanner, who practices family medicine at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. Sanner said he had given out hundreds of notes to protesters and many he spoke with seemed to be suffering from stress.
and down to WKOW 27 local news in Madison:
The Madison School District has said teachers who call in sick to protest won’t be paid. So, a group of licensed Wisconsin physicians came to the Capitol Saturday, willing to write a doctor’s note for anyone who asked.
Reporter asked, “Do you think you could get in trouble?” Dr. Kathy Oriel said, “Certainly, we think its worth the risk to support the people, and we feel very strongly these are officials who would really like to be in school, and in their classes, but they’re put in a position where they really have no choice.”
One understands the impulse to discredit a narrative that harms one’s cause. But if the era of blogging, Twitter, and omnipresent video has proven one thing, it’s that it’s better not to jump the gun. Whatever credibility you have is destroyed when you’re proven wrong.
Dodd: Andrew Breitbart is a lying sack of shit who every now and again utters a truth…
That you carry water for him tells the tale.
Ah, more ad hominems. Delicious.
I must say, it’s amusing you think this post is about Breitbart.
What tale does it tell? I can’t seem to “figure it out.”
I love how the “reality-based community” refuses to face reality when reality does not support their vision of the world.
Isn’t that the way that the left view education on a whole or economics as a whole.
I’m leery of anything Breitbart is associated with, because he’s demonstrated more than once that his first concern is publicity, regardless of truth. But it was clear already this morning that there was plenty of independent evidence of shenanigans going on here.
Lie-Bart has no problem using extra legal means to smear people or distort the truth so why should his opponents be barred from using similar methods? Dodd is either naive or disingenous if he thinks the WI public workers aren’t going to use every avenue open to them to block Walker’s ideological crusade which is why he’s going to fail ultimately. The fact that Lie-Bart is whining about this and Dodd is parroting it is faintly funny but one has to realize it’s just another little skirmish in the propaganda war. If Dodd and Lie-Bart think they are going to win against a prolonged campaign of passive resistance in a state which is basically blue in sympathies… good luck.
Dodd, you brought him into this discussion, not me. I just note that anyone who cites him is an idiot. If you actually have a point to make, here is a suggestion: Leave him out of it. Bringing him into it only labels you as a hack…. and I for one can not read beyond the first cite of him.
Good, bad, or indifferent… call me an asshole… call me an idiot… I really don’t care… If you quote AB…. ahhhhh never mind,,,, I’ll be good…. I will note only once again that AB is a lying sack of sh*t.
If your point is that Doctors support union teachers in their battle for their rights… Soooo????? Maybe that would give you pause????? Not!!!!!!
You are all about f*cking the working man, or woman….
superdestroyer says:
Sunday, February 20, 2011 at 18:37
“I love how the “reality-based community” refuses to face reality when reality does not support their vision of the world.”
Since when have I denied this might happening. It almost certainly is on a small scale. The unreality is on the part of people like you, JJ with his pompous bromides, Dodd with his parrotting of Lie-Barts propaganda, who expected anything else. The WI public employees will use every legal and semi legal weapon at their disposal just as Republicans do. Grow up or go and have a cry in the bathroom.
It’s difficult to address a falsehood promulgated to discredit a narrative without mentioning the purported basis of that falsity. Breitbart is entirely incidental to this story. He was merely the means to Crooks & Liars’ ends. Had they chosen some other bogeyman, he wouldn’t even be mentioned.
But it is interesting that Brummagem Joe has no problem whatsoever with lying to achieve his ends. Tu quoque FTW. Which completes the set. Deliciouser and deliciouser.
“If your point is that Doctors support union teachers in their battle for their rights… Soooo????? Maybe that would give you pause????? Not!!!!!!”
Doctors and musicians…the stupid people accoriding to Dodd, Breitbart, and co
“But it is interesting that Brummagem Joe has no problem whatsoever with lying to achieve his ends.”
Lying by political campaigns is an entirely unknown phenomenon? Republicans would NEVER DO THAT. Cross my heart and hope to die. Dodd is either stupid or disingenuous. I’ll leave you to decide which.
And the hits just keep on coming.
I assure you, I have no illusions whatsoever about the extent to which your pals will lie, distort, or otherwise pursue their attacks to get their way. But I am losing any delusions I might’ve harboured about your grasp of the First Rule of Holes.
If only the right had generated as much outrage over America committing torture and maintaining gulags as they do for doctors notes…
I repeat Dodd; “You are all about f*cking the working man, or woman….”
Tell me I am wrong, and then prove it.
You’re wrong. But one cannot prove a negative. Nor is your assertion in any way related to the topic; it’s just a transparent attempt to shift the discussion away from the actual topic. See, also, all versions of parroting/carrying water for Breitbart herein.
“I assure you, I have no illusions whatsoever about the extent to which your pals will lie, distort, or otherwise pursue their attacks to get their way. ”
Dodd: can you turn that mirror on your own POV? because as much as I respect James J, or Doug M, or Steve T (I disagree with ALL of them from time to time, but each have turned that mirror on themselves) I have zero respect for you.
I know you could care less (and I could care even less than you) But I have yet to hear you admit that you MIGHT… be wrong…
Not once. Maybe it has happened, maybe I missed it…. But Dodd, I read your posts… and your self rightousness (sp?) preceeds you..
Interesting reactions here.
The left: “If Breitbart says it, it’s obviously false and isn’t even worth talking about. And isn’t Breitbart a real stinker?”
The right: “Breitbart’s got a good record, so it’s worth a closer look. Let’s see… here’s a note signed by a doctor, with an ID number. Does that check out? Yup, that’s a real, licensed doctor with the right license number. And… looks like he’s only a resident, with no authority to practice away from his hospital, let alone at the state capitol lawn.”
The left: “But… but… Breitbart! He’s a big, stinky boogerhead!”
The right: “Don’t you want to talk about the doctor here committing fraud and violating the terms of his medical license on at least a couple of grounds?”
The left: “Breitbart! Breitbart! He said it, so it’s a lie!”
The right: “Here’s the proof, check it yourself.”
The left: “Breitbart!!!!!!!! Breitbart BAD!”
That sum it up about right?
J.
Throwing in Breitbart does make it unclear what point you are trying to make. Are you angry that docs are writing sick notes, or that Breitbart, a proven liar, was found to, probably, not have lied this time? Both? The article does not seem to spend that much time on the notes, just Breitbart and lackeys.
Steve
No, I really couldn’t. But do please feel free to keep attacking me if it helps you avoid the topic. I expect nothing less.
I’m not angry about anything. To repeat: Breitbart is entirely incidental to this story. This post is about Crooks & Liars being proven wrong in the same lame attempt to discredit the doctors notes story as has been so amusingly repeated in this comments thread.
***If only the right had generated as much outrage over America committing torture and maintaining gulags as they do for doctors notes…***
I have been speaking out against abortionists and the Public education system ever since I began commenting here, still do…….
> That sum it up about right?
No, but keep chockin’ that chicken if it makes you happy…
> because as much as I respect James J, or Doug M, or Steve T (I disagree with ALL of them from time to time, but each have turned that mirror on themselves) I have zero respect for you.
That’s about right.
“I have no illusions whatsoever about the extent to which your pals will lie, distort, or otherwise pursue their attacks to get their way.”
Thing is Dodd, we’re not tribalists like you are. We don’t advocate just for our pals and see all others as enemy tribes out grind us down. That’s what you guys do.
We’re trying to preserve conditions whereby everyone can have a living wage and a dignified life. We even think someone as narrow-minded and bilious as yourself deserves these things.
I don’t doubt that you sneer upon reading that last sentence, that you consider such thinking as weak and naive. That’s why we’re different from you.
And always will be.
All that’s missing from this thread is the wisdom of, no, I better not.
Some wisdom instead of all this projection would be welcome.
Sadly, it would do no good.
Speaking of turning mirrors on oneself, do you ever actually listen to yourself?
Ye gods.
I listened to him, Dodd. I guess you think it’s laughable to want people other than you to have a living wage and a dignified life.
Still more projection and ad hominems.
Still no responses in any way related to the subject.
And yet, you continue to post more than just caption contests and late night threads.
How long will James have to fall on his sword for you. (And seriously James, updating someone else’s post? At some point doesn’t it become…. tedious?)
Yes, I’m sure James gets tired of posting updates agreeing with his fellows.
But those whose knee-jerk reaction to jump in dogpiles of insults when inconvenient facts are demonstrated never get tired of it. If the goal is to put your opposition on the defensive and change the subject (and what else can it be, since nothing anyone has said in this thread has so much as touched the actual point?) it won’t work.
That said, pollute the thread with bile all you want. I won’t be responding to any more such posts. If someone has something salient to say about unethical doctors’ notes being handed out to protesters, OTOH….
Shouldn’t be too difficult to actually file charges if someone truly believes the law was broken. A patriot to stand up and be willing to go on the record. Not just mucking about on blogs but putting their good name on those charges.
I won’t wait for this to happen…
Sorry for you koolaide drinking liberals, but read Ann Althouse, seeing and filming it done. You are exactly what the liberals, unions and democrats rely on again and again, you prove exactly why they rely on you. You fall for it again and again, hook line and sinker. Doctors were out giving sick slips, more than Breitbart filmed it, yet you all want to discount it because it doesn’t fit your narrative. Call Brietbart what you will, but there are plenty of morons, that you all believe, spout the “truth” at msnbc, abc, nbc, cbs and cnn who lie to you more, yet you can’t remove the scales from your eyes. The situation in WI, is the start of the swirl to the bottom of the toilet, yet you can’t separate your bias from the shit at the bottom of the bowl and are going to go down with it, and willingly at that. mpw
The healine of your post is “Real Doctor’s, Fake Notes”. Note that you arrogantly assume you possess sufficient knowledge to determine whether a medical diagnosis is valid. But the incompetent usually do overestimate their abilities.
Here’s what you left out of your AP quote:
“One of the doctors was Lou Sanner, 59, who practices family medicine at the University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health. Sanner said he gave out hundreds of notes and that many protesters with whom he spoke seemed to be suffering from stress.
‘Some people think it’s a nod-and-a-wink thing but it’s not,” he told The Associated Press on Sunday. “One of the biggest stresses in life is the threat of loss of income, loss of job, loss of health insurance. People have actually been getting ill from this, or they can’t sleep.'”
and what you left out of your WKOW snippet:
“According to Sanner, many of the people he talked to seemed to be suffering from stress. He says he talked with individuals first and gave them notes when medically indicated.”
The doctor says his notes are given for whatt he believes are legitimate medical reasons. Hence, they aren’t fake.
mpw280, are you a WI resident? You could press charges.
I guess you didn’t watch the video in which He Who Shall Not Be Named was diagnosed with “walker pneumonia” as soon as he walked up. Nor have you read the various reports that say WI licensing law requires rather more than simply talking to someone in a crowd (i.e., patient records, including treatment plans) to make this all valid.
As for Dr. Sanner, he refutes himself. He gave out hundreds of notes, “many” of whom showed symptoms of stress. Not quoting those passages from the articles I linked to thus demonstrates the respect I think such patently transparent excuses deserve.
I appreciate that you actually addressed the topic, but your attempt to diagnose me from afar as a victim of the Dunning-Kruger Effect has rebounded back on you, I’m afraid.
My parents pay plenty of taxes in WI, do you? I am waiting until it comes home to roost in Illinois, several teachers I know are already talking up doing what the teachers in WI are doing here in Ill. If the cops can bust someone for filming themselves doing 140mph, I hope that maybe the WI authorities can take the appropriate action concerning the doctors handing out notes, that is supposedly their job. What I like is that most of the echo chamber wants to disbelieve that the doctors weren’t doing it because Brietbart filmed himself getting one, while several other sources had already confirmed the practice before Brietbart even showed up. You can ignore what you want but that doesn’t make it untrue. mpw
All this talk about Andrew Breitbart being a proven liar. I have to ask: where’s the proof that he tells lies?
“I’m leery of anything Breitbart is associated with”
Fine. Go to Ann Althouse’s blog – she was there too and has 3 seperate vids of doctors doing this,
“I’m leery of anything Breitbart is associated with, ”
Why?
1). I have yet to see any evidence doctors handing out these notes are violating Wisonsin’s laws. So far I see only allegations of it by commenters on three blogs, but if someone comes up with a link, do let me know.
2) “As for Dr. Sanner, he refutes himself. He gave out hundreds of notes, “many” of whom showed symptoms of stress. Not quoting those passages from the articles I linked to thus demonstrates the respect I think such patently transparent excuses deserve.”
You need to think about this Dodd. He’s not inadvertently admitting he gave notes to people who weren’t really under stress. He’s saying he didn’t give a note to everyone he talked to, only those he thought deserved them.
If you’re ill from stress, is a noisy political rally a wise place to be? Did these doctors advise their poor distressed patients to leave? Indeed it would appear they are enabling them to stay. Think about the idiocy you are defending. Is there any means the end wont justify?
Even assuming, arguendo that appearing stressed when you’ve called in sick to scream at the Governor all day is a valid medical reason to miss work… I would say you’re straining to find a positive meaning his words don’t support.
Am I doing the opposite? I admit the possibility (I sincerely think my interpretation is the plain one from what’s presented, but I also know how lousy news stories are about getting facts straight). But it doesn’t change the thrust of the story either way: “Hundreds” on notes handed out in a couple of days to strangers in a crowd is well beyond the boundaries of reasonable where actual, above-board medical care is concerned.
forget silver or gold…
buy aluminum. foil will be flying off the shelves.
Ben Wolf says:
Sunday, February 20, 2011 at 23:16
1). I have yet to see any evidence doctors handing out these notes are violating Wisonsin’s laws. So far I see only allegations of it by commenters on three blogs, but if someone comes up with a link, do let me know.
Here you go, skippy:
http://punditpress.blogspot.com/2011/02/university-of-wisconsin-department-of.html
DO read the comments from medical and legal professionals to edjimacate yerself as to the deep doo-doo these docs are in. Or did you try reading these comments but your lips got tired reading all those fancy words?
Can you say “qui tam statute”? sure you can.
Enjoy!!
Boy, the lefties sure are scared sh!tless, aren’t they?
> Boy, the lefties sure are scared sh!tless, aren’t they?
8 Years of Bush and the greatest country in the world nearly went down the toilet. Now the GOP is turning to folks who make Bush look like a rocket scientist. Yep, it’s scary.
It is interesting that the blog Crooks and Liars recognized that what the doctors were doing was wrong. The doctors certainly did not. One of them basically said that the end of helping the teachers justified the means of fraud.
When a blog goes out on the limb and makes claim that something is false that turns out to be true, credibility is affected. In this case, the credibility of Breitbart is enhanced and the credibility of the blog Crooks and Liars is diminished.
Finally, it is a bad idea to defend the indefensible; it is best to admit error and move on. If some of the commenters here understood that, there would be a much shorter comment stream here.
> DO read the comments from medical and legal professionals to edjimacate yerself as to the deep doo-doo these docs are in.
No desire from the right to bring Wall St types who raped the economy or Americans who ordered torture to justice, but a doctor that writes a phony note? Put the hammer down.
“No desire from the right to bring Wall St types who raped the economy or Americans who ordered torture to justice, but a doctor that writes a phony note? Put the hammer down.”
Please. Have you ever heard of the tu quoque fallacy?
Go look it up.
Consider what a judge would say to a defendant lawyer who said ” Your honor, my client may have done what the state charges, but why didn’t the prosecution go after (name your miscreant here) for the things they did.”
It would not be pretty.
Next:: . the Obama administration has been in office for over two years Why haven’t THEY DONE what you accuse the “right” of NOT doing?
“We’re trying to preserve conditions whereby everyone can have a living wage and a dignified life. We even think someone as narrow-minded and bilious as yourself deserves these things.”
Here’s the only thing I deserve: for you to stay out of my business, and to quit concerning yourself with my life. You want to give me dignity? OK, get away from me, stop acting like my income is your concern, and let me be free.
You’re a Puritan. You’re self-righteous and meddlesome. Enough. How dare you try to foist yourself into my life. Get away.
You’re “not a tribalist.” Yeah. You’re a tribalist, you’re a Puritan, and you haven’t even STARTED to understand what dignity is. You’re a sanctimonious poseur joke.
Okay, I’ve skipped the majority of comments here, because, wow.
As a Wisconsin resident who has been very obsessively following the protests from multiple angles, I will say, regardless of it was staged or not (I side on not), I saw literally nobody talking about this from the pro-union side of things yesterday. Not one tweet or blog post, not one person trumpeting for people to grab their sick notes. It’s really a fringe moment of the protests that the right-wing media is trying to clutch to, for the same reason everyone rushes to film any Nazi sign at any protest and pretend the whole protest was full of Nazi signs.
Which I suppose also supports that Brietbart didn’t stage it. I mean really, if he staged it the better narrative would have been to attack directly the teachers who came to get one from him.
“Here’s the only thing I deserve: for you to stay out of my business, and to quit concerning yourself with my life. You want to give me dignity? OK, get away from me, stop acting like my income is your concern, and let me be free.”
Ahh…if only that were the standard for so many things other than the money in people’s pockets…I do so hope that you are for complete freedom, not just where your money is concerned…oh, and do you think that all that you have is completely independent of anything that the government does for you? Just curious…
Why does someone with a degree need to be in a union?
> Consider what a judge would say to a defendant lawyer who said ” Your honor, my client may have done what the state charges, but why didn’t the prosecution go after (name your miscreant here) for the things they did.”
Except that we are not in court. I guess hiding behind a hypothetical is easier than taking a look in the mirror. The fact that you don’t seem to give a crap about senior government officials ordering torture, but are outraged about what is really a trumped up issue in WI simply shows you to be both gullible and in possession of a very weak moral compass. In other words, a perfect Republican.
> Next:: . the Obama administration has been in office for over two years Why haven’t THEY DONE what you accuse the “right” of NOT doing?
That they have not gone after the Wall St. crowd is pretty sad. As far as torture goes, Bush allowed it, then denied it. Obama has not done it, so he does not have to deny it. There is no equivalence.
BTW, I strongly feel that we need serious public pay/pension reform at all levels of government. It is a serious, systemic problem. It is also not what Walker is trying to do. Don’t be a sheep, they tend to get fleeced.
> Finally, it is a bad idea to defend the indefensible
Like saying you need to break certain unions for the public good (unions that oppose you), but leaving others (unions that support you) unscathed?
Yes, I see your point.
The odd thing is that the Left believes they are providing a decent living to these people. 100k in wages and benefits is decent, no doubt about that. At least that is what is reported.
Property taxes are way down for a reason. The tax payers here are losing their homes. These protesters are public servants, or no, that is what they used to be. Now they feel no obligation to the public.
But, give it time. Give Egypt and the Middle East time. The stimulus is beginning to inflate the worlds commodities. The shouting, vain popping, mock dictator wielding labor goons will be looking stressed out soon enough for sure.
Obama has issued the grounds for a worldwide revolt. Yes, Bush spent like a drunken Democrat, but Obama has touched off worldwide inflation that will define the coming years of misery.
I see an obsessive cast to all the effort being expended to make this about Breitbart. If there’s anything I have learned about advertising and politics and the tactics of deception it is that the problem is usually found at the source of the smell, not the sound and fury. Even little kids will ask the magician “how did you do that,” and the honest answer is always “misdirection.”
For many years I worked in a hourly position in an “agency shop.” That meant I didn’t have to join the union but I did have to pay dues. How happy my co-workers were when I joined the union! Little did they realize that they were welcoming a subversive into their clubhouse. And little did they care. The two words that spring to mind when I hear the word “union” are “dues” and “goon.”
The word “brother” gets bandied about a lot in the union world. Puts me in mind of the African-American gentleman who jumped a black thug in the midst of a mugging during a street fair in my town. The thug tried to pull the “brother” routine on the good Samaritan and was informed in no uncertain terms that the person rescuing the victim had no sympathy for the villain.
Since all the leftists here are trying to talk about anything BUT the subject at hand, I might as well do the same.
The doctors who wrote the notes, diagnosing “stress” — anyone else reminded of the abortion debate?
The standard exceptions often cited for public funding are “rape, incest, and the life of the mother.” Then that became “the health of the mother.” Then it became “the mental health of the mother.” Which to many abortion activists meant “the mother would feel bad if she had the baby, and would feel better if she had an abortion.’
Here the point of a doctor’s note for being absent from work is intended to cover actual illnesses that impair the employee’s performance, further harm their health, or risk the health of others. Instead, it’s being done here to not only circumvent the extremely-clear law — public employees can NOT take job actions like this — but to allow them to be paid for breaking the law.
And the doctors are breaking other laws and other oaths by aiding and abetting them.
“Elections have consequences.” Last November, the people of Wisconsin elected the governor and gave the majority of the legislature to the Republicans. As a consequence, the Democrats in Wisconsin are doing everything they can — including breaking numerous laws — to continue to get their way, despite being soundly rejected by the voters.
Strip the doctors of their medical licenses. Their violations are clear — especially those medical residents, whose legal authority to practice medicine is limited to their hospitals and most decidedly does NOT extend to freelance diagnosing on street corners.
Fire the teachers. They are breaking their contract and the state law.
Declare the Democratic Senate seats abandoned and vacant. Or, at least, cancel their direct deposit and force them to come to the Capitol and pick up their paychecks in person. Lock up their offices (they’re not using them) and stop paying their staffs. Cancel any state-issued credit cards, cell phones, license plates, or anything else the taxpayers are covering while they’re AWOL.
J.
Damn that Brietbart.
He has to be working for Rove or the EEEvil Koch brothers.
Not only did he stage the doctors but he somehow tricked actual, identified Wisconsin doctors and residents to comply with his evil rightwing trickery.
Does anyone know if he has explosives training or can confirm if he spent time around the twin towers prior to 9-11?
Ian’s Pizza in Madison is donating free pizzas to the demonstrators. Somehow the word got out, and Ian’s has been receiving donations from all over the US and the world to pay for the pizzas, as shown in this URL
http://tinyurl.com/6b83cq2
You can add Ian’s to your hate list, Jay Tea. What’s the matter with these people? Don’t they know that labor must be crushed?
I think a comprehensive audit of these doctors’ insurance billings are in order. After all, they’ve just shown on national TV they will commit fraud.
It’s one thing for Ian’s Pizzas to make a free choice to donate whatever it wants to whoever it wants. Sending government goons with guns to my house to steal money for crooked unions not so much freedom, more like slavery to the Copperhead collective.
The second Civil War will be about slavery too. You Copperheads lost the first one.
Government goons have never come to my house to steal money from crooked unions. What have I done wrong?
I like the way that J. thinks. Those doctors committed fraud a fraud upon the taxpayers. They should not be allowed to continue to commit crimes in private that they’re willing to commit in public view. Teachers who abandon the children in their classrooms don’t care about children. They care about themselves. Fire them. Every. Last. Damned. One.
“I saw literally nobody talking about this from the pro-union side of things yesterday”
Ah, good point. You see if people aren’t out telling reporters or tweeting about the fraud they are engaged in, it clearly does not exist. Brilliant insight.
The moralising and obsession with their own victimhood of Dodd and others while peddling stories by notorious scumbag Breitbart is immensely entertaining but not awfully material to events in WI.
Stan, the pizza place can do whatever the hell they want with their money.
The unions in question are demanding the public’s money, and doing whatever the hell they want to get it. Laws and contracts and ethics guidelines be damned.
Personally, whether or not I patronized the pizza place would be if I had before, and if the pizza was good enough to overcome my dislike for asshattery. More than likely; I’m loyal to good pizza.
On the other hand, you wanna talk about hate? How about all those people comparing Governor Walker to Hitler? Care to offer an opinion on that?
J.
> … do you think that all that you have is completely independent of anything that the government does for you?
That fact is NOT a license for government to jam Progressive economic moral values down our throats.
In fact, leveraging our government to do just that has kept people down for years and years … from welfare dependence, to the micromanagement of individual economic decision-making through tax policy and regulation, to the waste of money responding to government mandates that are not based in scientific/economic reality (think ethanol and the Climate Change Cult, as well as GM’s first EV attempt a decade ago in response to California mandates for ZERO-emission vehicles).
That is soft tyranny … not freedom, not dignity … in large part, because it is based in the Biggest Lie of All:
“All you need to do, is show up for work … we know so much more than you do, that we can solve your socio-economic problems FOR you. Don’t bother trying to take control of those yourself.”
Your Best and Brightest do not have the OMNISCIENCE to pull that off … yet you insist they try.
And as for Breitbart, Regressives … we see through your hypocritical attempts to invoke Alinksy Rule Four.
It is YOU who defend the indefensible, in your attempt to jam your morality down our throats with a zeal that makes Baptist preachers look like libertines by comparison.
Even if the doctors who were identified on tape escape prosecution, they will not be able to practice medicine in the near future.
Malpractice insurance carriers are always on the lookout for media instances that would show their insured clients in an indefensible light. It’s a risk thing. If, in the future, one of these doctors were to become involved in an incident were their truthfulness, honesty or integrity was to be relied on to avoid a massive payout, these videos would destroy that defense. Denying a doctor insurance is solely in the province of a business decision by the insurance company, there is no trial, no appeal, you’re just out.
Without insurance, it is next to impossible to find any place to practice. No hospital will grant privileges, no partnership will take you in.
Like most liberal ideas, it must have sounded good to them at the time, but if they would have taken five minutes to actually think it through, they never would have done it. The upside of this story is that the consequences will be imposed on the perpetrators instead of innocent victims, like most liberals actions.
Those doctors had better hope the University of Wisconsin medical school sees things your way.
It is sad (but true) that a misguided sense of altruism will have the consequences described by jwest. There’s something in here about pavement and intentions.
***Why does someone with a degree need to be in a union?***Because of the 8 yeras of Bush? lol……
Yes, jwest, innocent victims, just like those poor slave owners you lionize because, as you explained, they were just trying to help out the poor, innocent darkies who would have been lost without their protection.
Pardon me if I don’t take political advice from someone who has stated he is in favor of slavery.
Porkov, didn’t we see Andrew Klavan standing … and Chris Christie driving a taxi the “wrong” (aka right) way … on that very pavement recently?
“Ahh…if only that were the standard for so many things other than the money in people’s pockets…I do so hope that you are for complete freedom, not just where your money is concerned…oh, and do you think that all that you have is completely independent of anything that the government does for you? Just curious…”
Um, what part of “how dare you try to foist yourself into my life” did you not understand? You can rest assured: I’m for complete freedom. I couldn’t care less about “money,” and whether or not I do isn’t your concern. LEAVE. ME. ALONE. Get your gun out of my face.
> LEAVE. ME. ALONE. Get your gun out of my face.
Nobody give a crap about you. You can get back to Glenn Beck now.
Anjin-san – it is obvious that the teachers who are in a swivet in WI didn’t do their job when it came to teaching you grammar.
WR,
Only someone with a reading comprehension level as low as yours could interpret my comments as being in favor of slavery.
But while we’re on the subject, you seemed to equate all southerners as evil because some plantation owners raped and beat their slaves. Were all northerners equally evil because of the wealthy Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Baltimore residents who raped and beat their Irish contract servants?
My parents who survived the Siberian Gulag under Stalin said that when the end justifies the means the Communists (Progressives) will swear that it’s raining when you pour piss on their heads.
“Nobody give a crap about you. You can get back to Glenn Beck now.”
You know what’s so telling about comments like this (and they dominate leftist discussion)? They reveal a propensity to process politics as soap opera. It’s all about the characters and caricatures and the day-to-day plot — the story featuring the roles of GLENN BECK™! And SARAH PALIN™! And introducing… THE KOCHTOPUS™! All these little primitive touchstones your brain uses to get its footing — “Fox News,” “Dick Cheney,” “Michelle Bachmann.”
The irony is that it shows YOU to be the simple-minded thinker, the one who can’t think in terms of concepts and ideas and philosophy. It’s all about the characters, the heroes, the villains. It’s frikking goofy, man.
I couldn’t care less about Glenn Beck. I’ve never seen the guy’s show in my life. Stop making assumptions about the motivations of the people you argue with, and start reckoning with the actual concepts they put forward. Agree or disagree. Argue rationally. Anything else is a waste of everyone’s time.
And I long for the day when nobody gives a crap about me. Until then, your gun is still pointed at my head, and you’re a cretin for it.
Herman Cain got a sick note…..lol…..gonna be a good prop for his Presidential run.
Good news, this is now being investigated by one of our Senators who is also a Doctor:)
What are the doctors getting in return? Hall passes?
jwest — You’re the one who claimed that slave owners were merely looking after the welfare of those poor blacks who somehow ended up on our shores and would have been exploited by unscrupulous people if the owners hadn’t generously stepped up and stolen their life’s labor before working them to death.
I have seen nothing posted here from jwest that remotely relates to slavery. Did wr forget to wear his tinfoil hat?
Ben Wolf says:
“The healine of your post is “Real Doctor’s, Fake Notes”. Note that you arrogantly assume you possess sufficient knowledge to determine whether a medical diagnosis is valid. But the incompetent usually do overestimate their abilities.”
Ben. I’m a doctor. If I’m too sick to work, I sure as hell am too sick to hang out in sub freezing weather, especially for something as silly as “protesting for the working man” who gets over $100k in salary and benefits.
Fraud is fraud. A lie is a lie. Amazing how many “progressives” think lying and cheating are OK as long as they serve their ends.
Peej — With such a high level of compassion, you must be one hell of a doctor.
Re: TomD ..
“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.” – Eleanor Roosevelt
So much for the lame attempts by Re-, er, Progressives to invoke Alinsky Rule Four here, by straining at gnats about Breitbart, Beck, et. al. while swallowing the foolish camels of Progressive conventional wisdom whole.
wr – if I have a complex medical problem, give me a doctor with a bedside manner and skills like House over some bleeding heart incompetent any day.
The doctors are aiding in Fraud. Society should be able to expect more from them.
Perhaps this kind of lying and cheating by doctors and other health professionals is why Medicare and Medicaid are so rife with abuse and fraud and thus going broke. Hopefully this prompts the hiring of more investigators and more punitive punishments.
Now that we know doctors will lie for their patients, I’m wondering if we can rely on malpractice suits? Do doctors also lie in court so they can protect themselves thus lying against their patients? Probably. Glad we’ve moved to situational ethics – its now a dog-eat-dog world.
Peej — With such a high level of compassion, you must be one hell of a doctor.
Yep, that’s what I need — liars at my bedside… “don’t worry, everything is alright.. you’ll be well in a couple of days…. is your organ donor card up to date? How about your living will? “
***Yep, that’s what I need — liars at my bedside… “don’t worry, everything is alright.. you’ll be well in a couple of days…. is your organ donor card up to date? How about your living will? “***
lol, soon it will just be; is your organ donor card up to date? How about your living will? you don’t meat the requirements for treatment……
Porkov — I hate to burst your conservative bubble, but House is a fictional character.
But I guess if you listen to Republicans long enough you can’t tell the difference between fiction and reality.
> I have seen nothing posted here from jwest that remotely relates to slavery.
Possibly because you are a rookie here.
Porkov,
When the liberals here run out of nonsensical arguments for the subject at hand, they reach back to other topics on other threads in a pathetic attempt to save face.
It never works.
A jwest – Porkov hookup. All right.
Always figured there would be a sequel to “Dumb and Dumber”…
Wr,
“Yes, jwest, please explain again why slavery was such a force for good in the world.”
I’ve never said slavery was a force for good, but I do understand that not everyone who lived in the south and most who held slaves weren’t evil.
In the early years of our country, almost everyone accepted as fact the premise that whites were superior to blacks. Some believed that gave them the right, due to their self-perceived intellectual superiority, to subjugate people with different features than themselves. This same group of people managed to rationalize their views by claiming that it was in the best interests of the blacks to be cared for in the slavery system because they were not capable of caring for themselves.
Slaveholders believed that certain groups of people were simply not capable of existing in their modern society without their help and guidance. In exchange for their generous direction, food, clothing and shelter, they felt blacks should labor in their fields. Sure, some thought of granting freedom, but settled science convinced them that it was much better that blacks simply pay for their economic security with field work and let the educated elite plantation owners see to their benefit with lifetime employment.
People who think this way are not evil in its strictest sense. They are perpetrating an evil on others, but they believe they are helping and doing good. Freedom doesn’t enter into their equations because they can’t conceive of anyone not wanting the help they are giving. Although they know some need to be forced to conform to their way of thinking, in their hearts they believe it is for the best.
It’s amazing how little has changed in all this time and it’s the reason I don’t think of liberals as evil. Even with as much misery, poverty, ignorance and pain they cause with their well-intentioned programs, deep down they think they are doing right.
Porkov — jwest’s paean to the kindness and lovliness of slave holders came last week in one of those quick take topics. Unfortunately it has dropped off the list, as they tend not to last long. (I believe this one was about the reenactment of Jefferson Davis’ swearing-in ceremony.) Perhaps he will be kind enough to repost it for you.
Oh, wait, jwest did. And it’s even better than I remembered, because according to him Nazis who ran concentration camps weren’t evil, since they legitimately believed that Jews were inferior to regular human beings.
It’s amazing, though, that all these people who thought they were doing such good for the poor blacks were also making their money off the deal. I’m sure the fact that their entire economy was based on the subjugation of other human beings had nothing to do with why they chose to believe that whipping a man to death was for his own good.
Well, here’s one difference between you and me — I believe that if you “manage to rationalize” slavery, murder and rape, you are evil. That’s pretty much the definition of evil.
You think that’s peachy keen.
Wr,
If you weren’t so thick, you would have noticed that my comment on slave holders likened them to today’s liberals. Apparently, stunningly astute social commentary flies right over your head.
The basis of the comparison tries to show that some people who are committing evil acts don’t believe they are evil, and in fact believe they are helping the people they are harming. This argument has nothing to do with the Nazis (National Socialist Workers Party), which we can discuss any time you want.
Try to focus.
wr – one of the standard definitions of conservative is hewing to the status quo, reason be damned. The makes you and your bourgeois union reactionaries the conservatives in my eyes.
The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is
Rapidly fadin’.
And the first one now
Will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’.
Porkov:
Yep, bang on. They absolutely are the bourgeois conservatives in this scenario (and many other situations, of course). So unimaginative, so rigid, so utterly BORING. They fancy themselves as part of some bleeding edge, but the truth is that history will view them as clingers to a dying experiment.
I wasn’t just being colorful and metaphorical above when I described progressives as Puritans. That’s what they are, genealogically. That is their heritage — it’s the line that runs from the 17th century to the 21st.
It’s continually amazing how few of them realize it. The left is famously ahistorical, so I suppose it shouldn’t be a surprise.
TomD says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 16:59
“It’s continually amazing how few of them realize it. The left is famously ahistorical, ”
You have a masters in history then? Must have escaped your notice that most seminal historical texts were written by generally liberal leanig historians. In fact they are frequently accused of brainwashing the young with dangerously liberal historical ideas. You’re lucky to have escaped with your brain intact. Have you made a living will, I’m sure Regent could find a use for it.
Peej says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 12:39
“Fraud is fraud. A lie is a lie. Amazing how many “progressives” think lying and cheating are OK as long as they serve their ends.”
Of course Republicans and conservatives are NEVER guilty of such behavior. For a doctor you’re either very naive or very disingenuous. That’s the thing I lke about today’s conservative their moral absolutes are always so flexible.
“Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
C. S. Lewis.
And only one side of the Left v. Right political debate has embraced ends-justify-the-means moral relativism as a feature, not a bug … the other at least pays lip service to objective principle; the side that is characterized as inflexible fundamentalists by the popular culture. The other side, OTOH, will say or do almost anything to avoid confronting the fallacies in their conventional wisdom.
In fact, this divide is the most fundamental political divide in this nation … were this not so, we would converge on sustainable solutions as a nation far more efficiently.
jwest — I saw you babbled some nonsense trashing liberals after slobbering over the wonderful human beings who kept and sold slaves. That you don’t like liberals is no suprise. That you are willing to admit you approve of slavers is. Most “conservatives” try to pretend they think it was wrong. Thanks for your honesty.
Ritchie The Riveter says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 17:30
” the other at least pays lip service to objective principle;”
Actually I think you mean moral principle, but no matter, by the other I take it you mean the folks who think the earth was created 6-10,000 years ago. Please go on I could listen to you for hours, it’s all soooo profound. I’m sure C. S. Lewis didn’t spend a lot of time working for Henry Clay Frick, he was thinking these beautiful thoughts for the enlightenment of the workers while staring out onto an Oxford quad.
Of course Republicans and conservatives are NEVER guilty of such behavior.
As a rule, at least the right-wingers are usually ashamed by it… the liberals wear it as a badge of pride.
J.
Porkov — Please remind me to care about how I appear “in your eyes” one of these days. I’m sure I will stop caring about the destruction of the middle class and the further enrichment of the top 1% once I realize that you think I look old fashioned for doing so.
I’d love to know what you actually stand for. I assume it’s tax cuts for the rich, benefit cuts for everyone else, and giving people the freedom to die in the streets if they get sick. But I’m still so surprised that jwest is willing to come out in favor of slavery, I’d love to see what you have to add to this discussion.
“As a rule, at least the right-wingers are usually ashamed by it… the liberals wear it as a badge of pride.”
Thats just rather a juvenile assertion not a fact.
“but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience”
Was he talking about the Inquisition?
Over at The Sundries Shack recently, this question was asked:
“How is it fair to force someone else to contribute to the “moral good” only in the way you believe such a contribution should happen?”
Here was my take on it …
When you are a disciple in good standing of the Cult of Human Omniscience (also known as a Progressive), your way is the One True Way.
Had we deviated from that One True Way forty years ago, and encouraged private support of charitable efforts instead of putting all our eggs in the government’s social-welfare basket, we would have (as much as possible) won the War on Poverty … instead of perpetuating it across generations and, in particular, kept people of color down.
That isn’t because Progressives are inevitably evil … it is because government is quite limited in dealing with the causes of social dysfunction … limited to two tools in their toolbox, a bag of money and a set of handcuffs … because of the need to respect the rights of the individual and assure equal protection under the law.
These tools are simply inadequate to deal with the problems that underlie social dysfunction … problems that have significant, individual-specific behavioral/moral/human-judgment components that government (and its force of law) can’t address without “getting in one’s head” so deeply that freedom-of-conscience and personal liberty are unacceptably threatened.
And trying to impose solutions from the top-down, through faceless bureaucrats that lack the OMNISCIENCE necessary to accurately and effectively deal with these problems, is an invitation to disaster that has been repeatedly accepted by those in power who ascribe to the Progressive conventional wisdom.
Dealing with such problems through voluntary cooperation, via charitable entities or other means that lack the force of law and therefore the potential for abusing it, allows those who need help to get more than just money … they also can get help dealing with the causes of the problems, including reinforcement of the feedback loop between personal decision and consequence that will help prevent further dysfunction … and get that help without risk of having the providers run roughshod over their liberty.
It also precludes well-meaning, but wrong, caregivers from perpetuating their error through political connections that keep them financially viable despite their ineffectiveness at our expense.
Sam … no, he was speaking about “do-gooders” generically … the historical ancestors of today’s Progressives, who believe themselves so much smarter than the rest of us that they assume they should get to not only run things … but attempt to rewrite the fundamental principles of science, economics, and human interaction on our nickel.
“Must have escaped your notice that most seminal historical texts were written by generally liberal leanig historians. In fact they are frequently accused of brainwashing the young with dangerously liberal historical ideas.”
Talk about missing the point and/or begging the question.
Progressives aren’t liberal. They’re puritanical. They ply a suffocating ideology marked by backward, unimaginative old ideas about power, class and egalitarianism. It’s bourgeois and — yawn — boring.
If you’re a progressive, you don’t get to claim liberalism (or its historians). It’s not yours. Indeed, you’re its antithesis.
A couple of other things Progressives need to consider …
… their attempts at equalizing the distribution of wealth do not curb greed … they simply empower a different group to be greedy, with a far more intractable and oppressive force — the force of law — at their disposal. I can refuse to do business with a greedy corporation … but not with the government.
… corporate power over the individual is quite limited (were it not so, Sam Walton would have never gotten past WalMart #2) … except when corporations can collude with government and take advantage of that intractable and oppressive force to further their aims at others’ expense. It is quite ironic that those who yell the loudest about corporate “oppression” are the biggest advocates for expanding government … and in the process, expanding the opportunities for such collusion.
Ritchie The Riveter says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 18:27
“Sam … no, he was speaking about “do-gooders” generically …”
Am I alone at wondering at the reasoning power of someone who thinks a pipe smoking, tweed jacketed, upper middle class proffessor of poetry at Oxford has any real knowledge of the life of a worker in Henry Clay Frick’s Homestead Steel Works or in one of Rockefeller’s coalmines. And when the same person claims scientists are trying to rewrite the fundamental principles of science (he doesn’t define what these fundamental principles are) do you wonder again about his reasonning power.
TomD … that’s why I refer to them as Re-, er, Progressives.
Brummagem Joe: I should step back the “missing the point” accusation. I’m the one who wrote “the left is famously ahistorical” when for clarity I should have written “the MODERN left,” which was the subject at hand. But without that modifier, your response was not unreasonable. I assumed my point was clear from context, but my writing should have been more precise.
Joe, how about extrapolating observations by a 19th-century scientist into a conclusive “theory of origins” that makes a blanket assumption about time invariance of physical process … totally dismissing the possibility of outside intervention?
At least we Young Earthers do admit when we take a position on faith … something you Progressives leave out when you do the same in your analysis.
A more recent example is the folding/spindling/mutilation of the scientific method by leading members of the Climate Change Cult.
Of course, when your worldview is based upon the worship of your own omniscience … that is understandable.
And Joe … to borrow from you a little, I know I’m not alone at wondering how some faceless bureaucrat with an Ivy League school can know ME well enough to take over my responsibility to solve the socio-economic problems I face and get it right, every time.
That is exactly what Progressives advocate.
Keep in mind that any error on the bureaucrat’s part is an infringement upon my unalienable rights.
OTOH, I have compared what C. S. Lewis wrote to my experiences in real life, and my experiences validate what he has written.
And C.S. Lewis doesn’t deign to make my decisions for me, the way you would have your Best and Brightest do for us all.
Wildly off-topic for Ritchie:
Is your avatar supposed to be a South Park-ified Bob Seger? (I’m asking sincerely. If it’s actually some other well-known character or reference, consider me chastened for my out-of-it-ness.)
RTR — It’s pretty obvious you know absolutely nothing about the poverty in our country forty years ago. But you what’s really amazing about it? We’d had that poverty for decades, and we’d had charity, too. But the poverty wasn’t getting any better.
LBJ’s War on Poverty was hugely successful, dropping the poverty rate from 17.3 percent to 11.1 percent in a decade. Thirty years earlier, FDR’s Rural Electrification Act had a similar effect.
RTR — Sorry, didn’t realize you were a Young Earth Creationist. Please feel free to ignore the facts in my previous message. I’m afraid I’m wasting your time with actual information.
TomD says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 18:38
“I should have written “the MODERN left,” which was the subject ”
I can think of probably half a dozen historical works written in tha last 30 years by left leaning historians that are regarded as the definitive text on the particular subject.
Ritchie The Riveter says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 18:38
“TomD … that’s why I refer to them as Re-, er, Progressives.”
This what passes for humor in your part of the world?
Ritchie The Riveter says:
Monday, February 21, 2011 at 18:48
“OTOH, I have compared what C. S. Lewis wrote to my experiences in real life, and my experiences validate what he has written.”
I think the experience you’d really benefit from is a year working at Homestead or maybe the Ludlow mine. There’d be plenty of time to sit around reading C. S. Lewis or considering issues like the time invariance of the physical process…you could work on the vocabulary and grammar too
Brummagem,
Pick up a copy of Jacques Barzun’s, “From Dawn to Decadence.”
You can then let all your above-referenced definitive texts collect dust.
Reading any Barzun work might also change your ill demeanor. (YMMV)
Define poverty. Is it an absolute or relative condition? I remember life before television. The first family in town to get a television dwelt in a tar-paper shack and lived on charity. Mine had books and delusions of shabby gentility, and absolutely no use whatsoever for charity.
If poverty is absolute, where are all the skinny poor people?
tao9 — I’ve read “From Dawn to Decadence.” A brilliant history, although I don’t agree with his thesis that everything produced in recent times sucks. But issues of taste aside, I’ve never come across anyone who knows so much about, well, everything.
Didn’t change my demeanor, though. Or my politics.
You’re right, Porkov. Since we don’t actually have people dead in the streets, there is no poverty here. Good bye.
Pertinent news:
http://www.uwhealth.org/news/statement-regarding-uw-health-physicians/30653
I wonder how long Dylan would be ill for if he know “Porkov” was quoting him…
TomD … my gravitar was created on a website I discovered, where you can create your own South Park character. He was actually created “just for fun”, trying to make him look like me, right down to the gray hair/glasses and red Les Paul.
Several months later, when I had started posting as Ritchie, instead of my real name, on more-public sites … and got tired of looking at a blank gravitar next to my comments … I added him as my gravitar. He’s also useful as my unofficial “trademark” for my own rank-amateur music efforts. (Click on my name at the top of the post for more on that).
Joe/WR, having roots in Appalachia has educated me a little about poverty … and how government “assistance” can keep one there through dependence.
I also see what Progressive social policy has done to our inner cities, by encouraging intergenerational dependence upon government.
The poverty rate metric y’all cite doesn’t tell the whole story … and besides, why is 11.1% good enough, when there is a better way … especially when we spent around $3 trillion for the whole effort, when the returns diminished after, say, the first trillion $ or so according to the time frame you cite?
Y’all probably thought. Mr. Obama’s Porkulus was effective at curbing unemployment, as well … even though unemployment went up well above the level projected by Administration “experts”, even above the level projected if we did NOTHING. Time and again, Progressive “experts” don’t have a clue … and the sooner y’all realize that, the better.
Richie, I also grew up in rural America, and get your point. Gol danged revenuers! Now they’re out there with helicopters and infra-red cameras. If Dan’l Boone still lived in the forest named after him …
RTR — Your claim about a “better way” would be more convincing if it hadn’t been a complete and utter failure.
Of course you clearly have no interest in reality, just clliches parrotted from old Goldwater speeches. Intergenerational dependence on government? Yeah, that was a fine old story — back before Bill Clinton wiped out welfare fifteen years ago.
But keep pretending it’s 1982 and President Ronnie is telling you about those strapping young bucks buying Cadillacs with their welfare checks. If you don’t believe the world was created sometime after 1990, that is…
I absolutely think that we should look to the Democrats regarding the national debt. Specifically, Andrew Jackson, often described as the founder of the modern Democratic party. Under his leadership we were actually in the black.
Needless to say, I am not thrilled at the prospect of my children and grandchildren serving as coolies for China.
lol, I like the new guys:) please stick around, we need this blog to become fair and balanced again….In the comment section…..
@Porkov: Of course the fault for the budget mess can be laid at the feet of politicians in both major political parties as well as the people who continue to reelect those who prefer to keep kicking the can down the road…it is amazing how some people act as if the budget mess didn't start until January 20, 2009…oh, and your children and grandchildren serving as coolies for the Chinese? That's a bit much…
Your claim about a “better way” would be more convincing if it hadn’t been a complete and utter failure.
As if your way worked so well. The siren song of Progressive welfare policy created as many or more problems as it solved.
You believe that we are still Social Darwinists who would leave the truly needy out in the cold … and that the choices of the less-fortunate individual NEVER play a part in creating and/or perpetuating their impoverished state.
Of course you clearly have no interest in reality, just clliches parrotted from old Goldwater speeches. Intergenerational dependence on government? Yeah, that was a fine old story — back before Bill Clinton wiped out welfare fifteen years ago.
A fine old story that was TRUE, and lasted 30 years .;. and would not have been stopped without a GOP Congress dragging Mr. Clinton into signing welfare reform.
You would have us write a 21st-century sequel to that story, because of your profit-phobia and ignorance of human nature.
But keep pretending it’s 1982 and President Ronnie is telling you about those strapping young bucks buying Cadillacs with their welfare checks. If you don’t believe the world was created sometime after 1990, that is.
Actually there were a number of Appalachian people who were buying big cars with theirs … my father pointed those out to me … not to mention the tar-paper shacks in eastern Kentucky that the MSM zoomed in tight upon on TV in the 1960's to "prove" the poverty of the entire region — never showing the nice homes nearby that were owned by people who applied themselves and disproved that narrative.
You believe that personal responsibility is primarily a function of pocket depth … and that greed requires a NYSE listing, when the "non-profit" and even the needy, can be greedy when ti comes to other peoples' money.
IP … its also amazing how people forget the recovery in the economy and the growth of employment after the Bush tax cuts (we were even headed back towards budget balance). despite the irrepsonsible spending of a GOP Congress acting like Dim Lites …
… and that the start of the downward slide correlates well with the takeover of Congress by the Dims, particularly the ABRUPT flattening of employment growth in early 2007 … a flattening too ABRUPT to be the result of ecoonomic conditions, but instead indicative of a business community apprehensive about Dims attaining the power to carry through on an agenda of turning businesses into cash cows and social-services surrogates in the service of the State..
"…its also amazing how people forget the recovery in the economy and the growth of employment after the Bush tax cuts (we were even headed back towards budget balance)."
Oh really? Where is the evidence to support that claim? I wouldn't want to interrupt your narrative too much…