The question and answer segment was equally as pathetic. Both sides held tight to their talking points. The president danced around questions, and attempted to shed nearly all responsibility for anything that is not working.

You can read the transcript on TIME’s site (they also have an embed of MSNBC’s copy of the meeting).

It should be interesting to see how this effects the final vote for the health care initiative. If the Kennedy senate seat can go down, it has to make a lot of other congressman rather concerned about their fate.

One of the core tenants of the liberal platform is the redistribution of wealth. The basic idea here is that the wealthy should shoulder the burden of pretty much everything, because they can give more without feeling it as much as poorer people. Then why do they have a problem with the way things are working here in the United States?

Basically, the way the system works, is that the medical  community extract value any way they can, not only to recoup costs but to earn profits. However, not all countries can afford their products on a level playing field, but it would be fairly heartless to deny the third world treatment. So, companies offers medication, and procedures to poorer countries and they make it up by charging richer countries more.

The United States is, for the moment, the richest country in the world, therefore it follows that we would have to pay the bulk in this system. The system has been getting progressively worse, as other rich countries have been exerting upward pressure on the system, so we see health care systems in the UK, France, Canada that are using their bargaining power to bring down their costs, this puts more pressure on the United States, as we have to pay a larger share of the pie.

Granted, this is an over simplification of the health care system, as there are many other factors that contribute to high costs in the United States. It is just this one issue that consistently acts as a driving force, and I have never once heard a politician talk about how great is it that we pay the lions share for poor countries can receive much needed medical attention.

One of the core tenets of all the health reform plans is bring down the costs of domestic medical treatment. This would put downward pressure on the system, and would force providers to drive up costs in other markets. This would likely annoy the allies of the United States, as we would make their health care more expensive, and it would likely costs many lives in the third world as fewer people would be able to afford treatment.

Good times.

• The executive branch is held by a half-hearted socialist.
• The legislative majority holds a filibuster proof majority.

The situation reminds me of a very Thomas Jefferson quote:

A democracy is nothing more than mob rule, where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine.

UPDATE (2009-07-07):

Apparently, there is some magical article people point to, to say that Obama is not a socialist. I am not exactly sure how a socialist even got published in a newspaper, but in the opinion piece he says that Obama is not a socialist. Considering that the individual is a socialist they are not really a credible source on any given matter.

I approved a couple of the comments with a link to the article, and a received a bunch of emails on the matter. Seriously, are people searching for “obama is a socialist” and then going to sites and giving people shit about it?

However, to a certain extend I can see how you could try to make the argument since he is not attempt to enact full fledged socialists policies. If he was, he would never have been elected. Instead, we are getting shit on with half-hearted socialism that is currently mainstream.

I don’t think it is necessarily wrong to call Obama a socialist, since I think that’s the direction he is headed. It would be impossible for him to make the transition as quickly as he would like, because there is still a stigma associated with socialism to some extent (justifiably so). It seems to me, if the socialists really wants Obama to remain popular, and slowly convert to socialist policies I would deny his affiliation.

UPDATE (2009-07-08):

My assessment that Obama is a socialist is speculative. I agree that his current actions are neither pro-socialism nor pro-capalist. They are a shitty hybrid of both that not at all productive use of resources.

I do not believe that stating that since he ran as a democrat rather than a socialist means he is not a socialist. It means he made a pragmatic decision in order to be electable. Unfortunately, in the United States we have a wretched two party system, whereby other parties must submarine themselves in order to have a shot at getting elected.

My point about socialists not being credible is because anyone that believe that socialism is a workable system are on the same level as people that believe they were abducted by aliens.

Since Matt Renfer has been commenting on this post, I’ll share the link to a post he wrote about the subject on his blog: For the Record: President Obama is Not a Socialist. I do not agree with his assessment, but I encourage everyone to take a look at it.

Basically it boils down to the the following precepts:

• Small government
• Fiscal conservatism
• Low taxes
• Protection of individuals’ rights
• Foreigner interventionism

While those principles are nice (well maybe not the last) they really are not followed very well. If they were I wouldn’t have to write this post, and the party would not be in such turmoil. Note that I have no party affiliation so don’t jump to any conclusions yet.

Before I start getting into the meat of this, let’s take a second and look back at how we got here. Over the past thirty years the United States has been fairly conservative. Presidents Regan and Bush laid the foundation for the prosperity resided over by Clinton. Then came along George W. Bush. And then the wall fell. In a mere eight years under the administration of W. everything changed as his faction of the republican party managed to tear the party apart, and drive a rift between conservatism and the American people. Now, in a fit of reactionism we as a nation have sacrificed ourself on the altar of socialism. Thanks George.

The republican party now finds itself attempting to improve their images with the populous. Right now the party is undergoing and attempting to build itself a new figurehead to lead the party back into control. Unfortunately, the far right / theocratic wing of the party has leaped at the opportunity. These are the same people that screwed everything up in the preceding eight years. So I am hoping that their loud attempts are just a death rattle. At least these voices are not going completely unopposed.

Colin Powell has recently been making public appearances, and denounces the policies of the far right. While I agree that opposition is necessarily it needs to come from someone else. Powell is preaching moderations / centrism in order to make the party more mainstream. His argument is undercut by the fact that he supported the democratic candidate Barack Obama for president. This was in the face of John McCain, who was the strongest moderate in the party. Had Powell really cared about the party he should have backed McCain. Had McCain won the presidency it would have effectively put him at the head of the party and he would have had the power to change the direction of the party.

Many republicans thought that Powell essentially became a democrat by endorsing Obama. However, I don’t think this single infraction should result in him being kicked out of the party. On the other hand Powell’s views make it difficult to understand how he can consider himself a republican. I know that he is socially liberal, and he makes no dispute of that, but that alone still is not enough to decry him. I believe the problem lies in fiscal conservatism he seems to have no stand on it. I would think that as a republican he would be opposed to the massive growth being pushed by the current administration, but I am as yet unaware of any such public expression of dissent. So, if you are socially and economically liberal, doesn’t that make you a de facto democrat?

Even with all the strikes against him I still don’t think it would be appropriate to force him out of the party. However, I think it does prevent him from ever being an effective leader within the party. I believe the views espoused by Powell are as dangerous as those of the far right. The republican party cannot settle for becoming democrats or theocrats. The party needs a new voice that can rebuild the party upon their principles. And, more importantly, be ready to step in to fix the mess being created by the current administration. As I see it, its only a matter of time before the shit hits the fan.

Related Articles:

• Analysis: Powell flap gets GOP to ask ‘What kind of party are we?’
• Powell Jousts With Cheney on Path of Republican Party

• You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
• You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
• You cannot help little men by tearing down big men.
• You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
• You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
• You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.
• You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
• You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.
• You cannot build character and courage by destroying men’s initiative and independence.
• And you cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they can and should do for themselves.

The Ten Cannots was published by William J. H. Boetcker back in 1916.

When I originally saw this I thought it was kind of depressing. Today, when I saw it again I realized how uplifting it is!

• Increases WP install size to 87gb
• Increases WP memory footprint to 3.8gb
• Maintains a constant 20% load on the CPU
• “Donates” 60% of CPU cycles to moveon.org
• Sets your homepage to “change.gov”
• Puts an inspirational quote from former liberal presidents at the top of the page
• All pages trigger a popup requesting donations to random liberal charities
• DoS attacks “big oil” servers
• Allows anyone to register, and post to your blog
• and much more!

Click Here to Download

“And though we fell short, the failure is mine, not yours.” -John McCain.

At the moment, it just seemed as though he was trying to be humble, but now that I think about it, he was probably just telling the truth. I am starting to believe that McCain intentionally threw the election. It kind of make sense, because McCain the candidate was so different from McCain the senator. I mean, just look at some of the things he did to destroy his chances of winning:

• He failed to properly differentiate himself from Bush
• He ran a dirty campaign, even though he said he wouldn’t
• He selected a running mate that is batshit crazy
• There was no coherent campaign narrative
• He failed to oppose the government bailout of the financial industry
• He attempted to attack his opponents character through tenuous associations
• Etc…

Seriously, in this day in age, how could all those things have come together if it wasn’t intentional.

I suspect that on that election night…Obama had a diamond stuffed up his anus (South Park reference ).