Dear Republicans: Your cruel and reckless policies are terrifying millions of your fellow Americans and I’m trying to understand how you’re okay with this. Many of the planks from your party’s platform don’t even make sense from a conservative standpoint.
UPDATE: With the GOP trying to ram through their Graham-Cassidy Affordable Care Act ACA with a Sept. 21 Public Policy Poll showing only 24 percent support from voters — and evidence of Donald Trump’s collusion with Russia piling up by the day, the Republican Party comes across as more and more irrational and senselessly cruel by the day.
Can any Republicans out there please answer these questions?
1. Why are you outraged by Hillary Clinton’s mishandling of classified information — which the GOP-appointed former FBI Director James Comey said was careless at times but not illegal — but not Donald Trump’s frequent breaches and connections with our long-time enemy, Russia?
2. If the GOP’s policies create jobs and prosperity, why are the 20 poorest states (except for New Mexico) run by Republicans?
@ihartchelle @ChelleMercedes @amber greene Most of the poorest states in America are @GOP #redstates & take more money from gov. #GOP only care 2 help #richgetricher pic.twitter.com/IiA7UhM1Qn
— MS (@msail17) April 24, 2017
2a. If GOP lawmakers care about their constituents, why is the quality of life in GOP-run states worse by nearly every possible measure?
3. Do you think the government should protect you and your neighbors from a corporation poisoning your community’s drinking water? Or polluting our air? Or should companies have the freedom to do whatever’s most profitable for them?
4. In a free market, shouldn’t groups of American workers have the right to pay organizations to represent their interests the way big corporations pay lobbyists and make campaign donations? If so, why are Republicans against unions?
5. If tax cuts for corporations boost the economy and create jobs, and corporate taxes paid have declined since the 1960s, where are all the jobs?
It is often claimed that American corporate tax rates are much-higher than the international peers @joshbivens_DC https://t.co/cNJOG2YrQy pic.twitter.com/T1Fd9Ov4QL
— ACEMAXX ANALYTICS (@acemaxx) May 21, 2017
6. Why do Republicans think rich people and corporations deserve tax cuts more than middle class and low-income working families?
7. If we cut federal regulations and public services to prevent government overreach, what will prevent corporate overreach?
8. Since employers no longer provide health insurance and you want Obamacare repealed and defunded, are you okay with you, your family members, or your neighbors getting sick or dying from treatable conditions?
9. Since CEOs get paid millions of dollars while even the president of the U.S. makes only $400,000 a year, why do you think the private sector provide public services more efficiently and economically than the public sector?
9a. Why do you think it’s better for public schools, prisons, and other public services to be run by for-profit companies?
10. Why do you believe protecting our borders more important than protecting the health of our citizens? 45,000 Americans died each year from lack of health insurance (before the ACA) and just 74 die per year from foreign terrorist acts,
[CORRECTION NOTICE: I accidentally linked to the same Business Insider article twice. The first link ed to an article in the Harvard Gazette that cited a study from the American Journal of Public Health].
10a. Do you believe healthcare is a human right? If not, why won’t the lawmakers you voted for just come out and say so?
11. If there aren’t enough jobs to go around and the government shouldn’t employ more people, what happens to the millions of people who want or need jobs and can’t find one?
12. If one of the women Donald Trump bragged about grabbing “by the pussy” was your mother, wife, or daughter, would you still have voted for him?
12a. Do you think the way Donald Trump talks about and treats women is acceptable? I always thought conservatives believed in protecting women.
13. Far more Americans are killed by white male terrorists than by Islamic extremists, and law enforcement agencies now see white anti-government militants as among the greatest threats they face. Should we start profiling angry white men the way we do Muslims?
white male terrorists – need to start profiling white men – they do the most mass shootings – white men are dangerous "Washington Square" pic.twitter.com/GEkC5wAoa0
— Olivia Skyner (@OliviaSkyner) January 26, 2017
13a. Why are you okay with white supremacists but not Black Lives Matter?
Not one American flag #Charlottesville pic.twitter.com/GviKRZq6LP
— vlh (@coton_luver) September 22, 2017
14. Americans work more hours than people in any other industrialized country except for South Korea. So if the secret to success is “hard work” — instead of some having the system rigged in their favor — why aren’t we all rich?
https://twitter.com/InvestingLatest/status/619152612072550400
15. If the United States of America is a “Christian nation,” why don’t the words “Christian,” “Christianity,” or “Jesus Christ” appear anywhere in the Declaration of Independence or the U .S. Constitution?
15a. Why do you think it’s okay to force laws and policies based on your religious beliefs on those who don’t share your beliefs? (Such as climate change denial, bias towards LGBT people, and denying women her constitutional right to reproductive choice). If our country had a Muslim majority instead of a Christian majority, would you think that gives them the right to impose Sharia Law?
16. If you’re “pro-life,” why do you support the death penalty?
2.4 million Planned Parenthood patients & millions more are counting on us to #ProtectOurCare. Tweet your lawmaker: https://t.co/okN3aY4hj3 pic.twitter.com/YzsvB0RMKW
— Planned Parenthood Action (@PPact) September 20, 2017
17. If you’re against abortion, why don’t you support making birth control more accessible so fewer women need abortions?
17a. Do you think it’s acceptable for a democracy to force girls and women to have babies against their will because of your religious beliefs?
18. If a child’s parents make bad choices, do their innocent children deserve to go hungry because of it?
19. Why do we need to spend more money on the military?
https://twitter.com/ForgottenLinks/status/755853090633297920
20. If it’s okay to require a license, registration, and insurance to own a car, why isn’t it reasonable to require the same for owning a gun?
21. Why do we punish undocumented immigrants but not the people who hire them to avoid paying people like you higher wages?
21a. If you believe in “family values,” why do you support senselessly cruel and unnavigable immigration policies that tear families apart and punish their children?
22. 97 percent of scientists agree that climate change is a major threat and that it is caused by humans. Your community is likely among those that will be affected. Why don’t you believe them?
“Climate change intersects with hurricanes by increasing storm rainfall, intensity, and surge.” https://t.co/rNlY589mH5 pic.twitter.com/FMXN04zr0h
— Climate Reality (@ClimateReality) September 22, 2017
23. How does banning gay marriage, forcing women to have babies they don’t want, requiring transgender people to use the bathroom of their birth gender at the risk of bullying and physical violence, and elevating corporate rights over individual rights square with your conservative principles of personal freedom?
24. Do you think people addicted to opiates should receive help and treatment or be left to die on the streets?
25. Have you ever received help from a Federal government program when you’ve needed it?
26. If you answered “yes,” what would you have done if that help were not available?
27. When has a law or policy promoted by the Republican Party ever helped you when you’ve needed help?
28. If Republicans aren’t racist or sexist, why do their policies disproportionately hurt women and people of color?
After writing this, I got some thoughtful responses from some conservatives.
Here are two follow-ups posts. Also, while I was specifically talking about Republicans and the GOP, I also heard from thoughtful conservatives / right-leaning independents who often support some but not all of the above stances I mentioned.
- 20 Questions From A Republican Because Democrats Make No Damned Sense To Him
- Conservatives Answer A Liberal’s 28 Questions, And They Still Make No Damned Sense To Her
Featured image: cc 2011 Chiltepinster via Wikimedia Commons with flag added.
I really like many of your points, but several of the questions are worded from the view of fairness/eqiality priority rather than tradition/vigilance priorities which are typical of Conservatives. You have to speak their language if you want them to comprehend and act. You cannot change their minds by pointing out hypocrisies–because in their worldview those ideas do not conflict. You cannot force the blind to see, but you can listen to what they hear and help them understand how the objective world correlates to their experiences.
Good point…I tried to frame some of my questions from what I understand of the conservatives’ perspective but couldn’t do them all that way.
Here is a test from “Defend the Constitution” perspective….
Are you an American? Take this test to find out! This test comes right out of the spirit of the US Constitution as a system of Compromise Government. Some powers did not exist when the Constitution was authored and some are irrelevant, but the spirit and intent remains the same.
1) Do you believe in fair, free and accessible elections for All the People so the candidates chosen represent the entire electorate?
Yes or No
2) Do you believe that politicians should pick their voters in the gerrymandering process of political party created voter districts?
Yes or No
3) Do you believe that special interests and powers like Religion, Corporation, Political Party, Other Nations or Races should have special privilege or control of the agenda of the US government?
Yes or No
4) Do you believe that strong checks and balances between all the branches of government – the judiciary, executive and legislative – are needed to prevent the monopoly of any one in the agenda of government?
Yes or No
5) Do you believe that a free press, independent from agenda seeking ideology, ought to have a right to bear witness to the process of government so that the voter can make informed decisions about issues of economy, international relations and the responsibilities of of ensuring liberty?
Yes or no
6) Do you believe that all the words of the Bill of Rights are applicable and none should be cherry picked, emphasized, or ignored for sake of special interest or ideology that includes: Free Speech and right to peaceful assembly and protest, Gun rights and regulations; Housing of soldiers in private homes; Unreasonable searches and seizures; Double jeopardy and self-incrimination and guarantees the rights to due process; The right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury; No cruel and unusual punishments; That there are additional fundamental rights that exist outside the Constitution and that powers not granted to the federal government by the Constitution, nor prohibited to the states, are reserved to the states or the people?
Yes or no
7) Extra Credit: Do you believe that the unconstitutional behavior of a few ought to take away the any of the bill of rights of the many?
Yes or No
Elisabeth, may I post your questionaire on FB, and jasciu, may I use your Defend the Constitution questions? I would like to add it to the above questions from Elisabeth.
Its better for you to link to the questions here.
Love your list of questions. I have always believed that good questions can be the start of healthy discussion tolerant, change, compromise…all those things that lead to compromise and progress in a healthy political arena.
I would add on #3…Do you realize you and your family will drink and breathe the same poisonous water and air?
I plan to post one of these questions a day on my FB page to try to start a dialogue with FB friends who up to now have not shown any interest in talking about our current political situation. I also plan on adding questions as my friends comment. I will keep a list and will be happy to send to you the new questions that I add.
Thank you for articulating this list of questions to help millions of us make sense of the implausible orders and actions so far promoted by the DT administration. Why is it that some Americans are still aggrandizing the Emperor’s new clothes when everyone can clearly see he is wearing nothing?
I will answer as many of them as I can, but i have a few I would like to ask the Democrats.
1. If the Democrats are no longer racist, why do they insist on excluding white men from affirmative action, regardless of how poor the man is?
2 why do we even need affirmative action? Aren’t minorities capable of success on their own merits?
3. If it is the responsibility of the wealthy to share with the poor, why are so many Democrats millionaires? Shouldn’t they be sharing the wealth?
4. If socialism works, what happened to Venezuela?
5. If gun control works, why are the most violent cities in America the ones with the strictest gun laws?
6. If illegal immigrants are good for the economy, why didn’t they improve the economy of where they came from?
7. Do you think it’s wise to reward people for breaking the law?
8 if the police are violent racists, why do you want them to be the only ones with guns?
If the police are violent racists , why do you call them when you are the victim of a crime?
How is blocking a highway improving black lives?
Where was your outrage when the Obama administration sold weapons grade uranium to Russia?
If Christians are evil for not celebrating gay weddings, what are Muslims who throw gay people off of buildings?
If Christians are evil for not supporting abortion, what are Muslims who stone women to death for having one?
If conservatives are anti- woman for expecting them to buy their own birth control, what are Muslims who don’t even allow women to drive a car?
Why does it cost over 40,000 dollars to adopt a child, but only 3,000 to kill one?
If marriage is slavery, why do you support it for homosexuals?
If there are so many genders why are there only 2 different genitals?
If guns cause crime, why do we surround the president with armed men? Aren’t we putting him in danger by doing so?
If Republican states are so poor, why do we have the most retirees?
If Democratic states are so rich, why are they always borrowing money?
If socialism works so well, why are over 2/3 of the asylum seekers applying for refuge in the United States from socialist countries? Shouldn’t we be fleeing to them?
Nice set of straw men, slippery slopes, false equivalences, and deflection. #logicfail
1. If I understand your question correctly, you want to know why white men don’t automatically get a job because of their skin color? Correct? You do. All. The. Time. That is why affirmative action was started. Personally I think that last names with first name initials only should be on applications. No sex, no religion, no skin color, just J. Smith and then a list of qualifications that make you the best candidate to be hired.
2. Refers back to number one. White men get jobs by being white men. When your skin color and sex automatically get you a job, you don’t need affirmative action. It was put in place to help out minorities, who ARE qualified, but couldn’t get work any other way.
3. I’m sure they are. Lots of donations to charities, etc. No one said the rich had to go broke helping the poor, just help.
4. Is Venezuela the only country you could find, cuz Europe is doing great? Who knows what happened. Maybe bad leadership. Maybe insufficient resources. I haven’t studied Venezuelan history, but you seem to know so much, maybe you could tell us.
5. Because they are surrounded by counties, cities, and state with lax laws.
6. Job opportunities aren’t there.
7. don’t understand the question. Are you referring to immigration? Murder? Rape? Theft? Which laws?
8. No one said that. Just because we don’t want you to own an assault rifle does not mean we want cops to be the only ones with guns. Typical tactic of conservatives. Gun CONTROL = you want to take my guns. Nope. Lots, and lots, and lots of democrats have guns. We just want responsible gun ownership. If you need a license to drive a car, and for conservatives to vote, then why not to own a gun?
9. This question makes no sense. Your point is lost.
10. This question, and maybe the one before it, prove that you are being contrary to be contrary, which makes this whole question list disingenuous. You know that it doesn’t (blocking the highway), but you want to be dismissive of the movement, so you reduce it down to blocking highways.
11. Same place your outrage is over Trump’s collusion with Russia, bragging about sexual assault, refusal to turn over his tax returns, and most importantly costing the U.S. tax payers 1 million a weekend to go golfing, and an additional 1 million to house the secret service in his hotel, then charging them for the stay, so he can pocket the money that he charges the secret service to protect his wife because she refuses to live with him, at the tune of 1 million per week.
12. Not in the U.S. they don’t. Democrats have no control over other countries. Just like I cannot go to your house and tell you what to do in it, Democrats cannot legislate, police, or run another country. What happens in the Middle East on the leadership of the Middle East.
13. No one said Christians were evil for being against abortion. Your just being told to but out of other people’s lives. And THAT is what you equate as evil, having no say in someone else’s decision making. As for the stoning, not in the U.S. Democrats cannot control what happens in another country.
14. Not in the U.S. they don’t. Again, Democrats have no political say in another country. Here in the U.S. Muslim women can and do get their drivers licenses.
15. I can’t answer the question on the cost of adoption, but I agree, it is way too much. As for killing children, it is particularly evil of you to know that children are being killed and you have not reported it to the authorities. You will have to supply names, addresses, and information about each murder/killing. This whole list of questions has been exceedingly judgmental, and you have just admitted to knowing at least one murder/killing has occurred and you have done nothing about it. That says a lot about you.
16. This question is disingenuous at best. At the very least it is a made up argument. Please support links, references, or articles that support your claim that Democrats think marriage = slavery.
17. There aren’t. There are at least four.
18. Another disingenuous question and meant to be contrary for contrary’s sake. As for the armed men around the President ask Lincoln, Reagan, Kennedy that question.
19. Standard of living is lower and the weather is better. Individuals make their money up north where the pay is better, but standard of living is higher. Retire down south, money goes further and no snow.
20. Same reason you do. To start a business.
21. Really?! Asylum seekers are coming from war ravaged countries. If you cannot understand why someone whose country is at war and needs asylum, then you are damaged beyond my comprehension, and shows that your response was a dismissive response to the article, not an actual attempt at understanding.
Great rebuttal!
This is awesome, Heidi!
Hi Kurt…I responded to your list of questions here: https://elisabethparker.com/20-questions-from-a-republican/
1 and 2. White people are still the majority in our country and it can be demonstrated that people are much more likely to hire people of their own race. Affirmative action mitigates this unfair imbalance, that is all.
3. We poor hate the millionaire Democrats just as much, actually. Almost nobody is a millionaire through their own hard work.
4. You already live off of socialist systems. Much of our infrastructure is technically socialist; public transportation, road work, public schools and more.
5. Gun regulations will only work smoothly when it is the same across the entire country instead of varying from one state to the next.
6. What an absurd question. Are you yourself at fault if your own town or city is struggling? Of course not. Outside as well as internal pressures affect quality of living. Immigrants may come from countries we ourselves ruined through our warmongering and slave labor.
7. Don’t know what this question is even referring to.
8. We don’t. I don’t know a single democrat who believes in banning guns from citizens. That’s a ridiculous strawman. We want REASONABLE regulations. Right now they are unreasonable, or it wouldn’t be so easy for any terrorist or serial killer to get all the weapons they please.
9. “If the police are violent racists , why do you call them when you are the victim of a crime?”
What choice are we given? We all have to just flip a coin and hope the cop we called will actually do their job. Every day however cops brutalize the same people they were supposed to protect. Cops show up and shoot homeowners, in their own homes, on suspicion of actually being the burglar. Cops also rape and molest people they pull over. New cases are uncovered constantly but little is done to avert these things.
10. “How is blocking a highway improving black lives?”
So you’re saying people unhappy with an unfair system should have to protest it quietly and out of the way? What will that accomplish?
11. “Where was your outrage when the Obama administration sold weapons grade uranium to Russia?”
Snopes.
12, 13 and 14. Why are you under the impression that people forgive (or ignore) radical muslims while demonizing radical Christians alone? Everyone I know and have ever heard of condemns radical bigotry in all of its forms, in all religions. Muslims, however, are no more likely to be radical or dangerous than Christians, especially not in America where Christianity dominates with a stranglehold. We are sick of Christian extremists in our white house.
15. “Why does it cost over 40,000 dollars to adopt a child, but only 3,000 to kill one?”
Abortion doesn’t kill a child, it terminates a thoughtless embryo within the body of another person, which is that person’s domain to dictate as they choose.
16. “If marriage is slavery, why do you support it for homosexuals?”
What in the hell are you referencing here? I’ve only heard people *joke* that marriage is like slavery. Nobody means it literally. Everyone supports people choosing to marry.
17. “If there are so many genders why are there only 2 different genitals?”
Gender by all known social and dictionary definitions has always been a different category from sex.
18. “If guns cause crime, why do we surround the president with armed men? Aren’t we putting him in danger by doing so?”
This is a nonsense question. Why would these be related?
19. “If Republican states are so poor, why do we have the most retirees?”
Conservatism is more attractive to the elderly. Successful retirees, able to move anywhere they wish, are therefore more likely to live in Republican states. Older people also had more opportunity to retire over a longer period of time.
20. “If Democratic states are so rich, why are they always borrowing money?”
They consistently demonstrate that they can turn it around into economic surplus.
21. “If socialism works so well, why are over 2/3 of the asylum seekers applying for refuge in the United States from socialist countries? Shouldn’t we be fleeing to them?”
Those countries are war-torn. Socialism is not their reason for leaving. Most of said wars are also directly our fault.
Bravo!
What’s wrong by the way, Kurt? You said you would answer the article’s questions for republicans, but you’ve neither done that nor acknowledged the many responses you’ve gotten.
Re #8, I’m pretty sure my employer is still paying for my health insurance. Otherwise, this is a great list.
Thanks, Eric. I’m glad your employer covers your health insurance. My husband and I rely on Obamacare because I’m self-employed and he’s stuck in contracting limbo. We earn decent money, pay taxes, and our health plans are expensive. Still, without the ACA, we couldn’t possibly afford health insurance at all.
Hope this helps…
https://www.facebook.com/notes/bills-politipalooza/response-to-28-questions-for-republicans/458288774519485/
Elisabeth, I answered your questions incredibly thoroughly. In the spirit of friendly knowledge sharing, care you to answer my much simpler 5 questions?
1. In what instances have societies successfully instituted public ownership of the means of production without collapsing or quickly installing capitalism to keep from collapsing?
2. If a baby is full formed and capable of living outside the womb, what is the moral justification for saying it is a better decision to kill the child than be inconvenienced for 2-3 months and then allow the child to live with another loving family?
3. 45% of Americans pay no federal income tax. The Top 20% of all income earners pay 84% of all federal tax and the top 1% pay 35% of all federal tax. How would you recommend these number shift to make it more fair as you say is necessary?
3a. Explain the economic mechanism by which taxing the rich more increases jobs and prosperity for the middle and lower classes.
4. Given the U.S. could reduce its carbon emissions by 100% and world carbon output would still increase because Asian countries are largely exempt from the climate accords, what is the case for trying to speed adoption of green energy by outlawing inexpensive energy sources that keep costs low for the poor and middle classes?
5. Why should be lawful for workers to voluntarily form unions but unlawful not to want to join and pay dues?
Bonus. While I am not the biggest Trump fan, your questions leave me curious — please explain how it is you believe unproved anonymous allegations about information being passed by the President who is legally able to declassify anything he wants is worse than a Secretary of State and Presidential candidate proven by the FBI to have illegally removed confidential markings from documents passed illegally to un-cleared sources from a hidden private unsecured server.
Don’t have time to answer all of your questions but 3a is pretty simple. Having owned a business, still do, if I can avoid falling into a higher tax bracket by investing in my company, I invest. It is pretty simple. Aside from the Historical precedent, higher taxes tend to incentivize investments vs. hoarding money. It is a great way to promote economic growth. And the taxes don’t hurt either. You know we have this debt thing we would like to pay off someday.
Then where is the economic growth? Having the Dow Jones Industrial Average isn’t enough. For most Americans, the kind of “economic growth” we want means more jobs/demand for labor and rising pay. The “Free Market” has more “freedom” than it’s had since the Gilded Age and the Roaring 20’s yet recessions are frequent and the recoveries are slow and weak.
“The “Free Market” has more “freedom” than it’s had since the Gilded Age and the Roaring 20’s”
Really? The Fed has manipulated free market interest rates out of existence, half of Americans have single payer health care right now today, there are more ‘too big to fail’ banks today than every in our nation’s history, and industries from banking to telecommunications to airlines to food manufacturing, to broadcasting are more consolidated and less competitive than they have been for decades. Efforts to regulate have strengthened those with the resources to cope.
Where’s the economic growth? It’s tied-up overseas because of our worldwide tax system (the only one int he industrialized word) that punishes wealth from multi-nationals brought back to the U.S. Further, we have the largest bank reserves on hold at the Fed in the history of our nation. Never has so much money been produced to sell bonds but not put into circulation to actually been put to use. This isn’t a Democrat vs. Republican problem, this is a reality problem and playing the partisan blame game is fun and all but ultimately counter-productive.
I stand by my statement about the “free market” having more freedom than since the Gilded Age and the Roaring 20s. The 2008 recession happened as a direct result of the Glass-Steagall Act being repealed and Wall Street running amok. The fact that banks are bigger than ever and that corporations keep consolidating (and shedding jobs in the process) shows that we barely have any regulation protecting consumers in effect at all. If it’s been that bad under a Democratic administration, I’m terrified to see what’ll happen under your so-called “unified Republican government” that the American people voted AGAINST by 2.8 million. As for economic growth being “tied overseas,” that’s because unpatriotic companies go to EU nations because they don’t have to cover employees’ health insurance there thanks to single payer, or because they contract work out to poorer countries that still allow unregulated sweat shop labor. There’s no damned way U.S. workers can compete against that, and they shouldn’t have to. The U.S. is the only industrialized nation that doesn’t protect its workers and makes it easy for countries to move oversea. And I agree that the Democratic Party has had a hand in this, but it’s the Republican Party that’s doubling down on it and pushing policies that will make these issues worse. In fact, Donald Trump “won” because he promised to protect U.S. workers and bring the jobs back. But the policies and actions of his administration make it clear that he was lying. I’ve been following news and politics for decades and seriously cannot come up with a single example for when conservatives have upheld individual rights over corporate rights.
Oh, this looks like fun: (Full disclosure i’m libertarian)
1. Same reason no democrats cried foul when Obama was killing US citizens by drone strike, partisan folk be partisan. Also while a buffoon move it is in his executive privilege to declassify whatever he wants.
2. Re-rack the numbers on “cost of living” vs income and try and make the same point.
3. Not an argument, but in this social media landscape and sue happy populus we are never going to have mass pollution from a corporation again.
4. Part A, of course at least in the private sector If you sign up for government work then no union for you Part B, again partisanship any look into campaign finance can see how much big unions dole out for the D’s At this point its just historical times, unions and corporation feed off the same payroll.
5. I don’t understand the question? Unemployment in the US is on par or better then most 1st world nations.
6. Top 4% of earners pay 57% of all taxes, bottom 44% pay near zero?
7. Free Market
8. Not an argument and an emotional plea, employers provide a majority of heath insurance. Government does not need a health insurance role.
9. What does CEO or the presidents pay have to do with anything? And yes I use UPS over USPS for anything other then a letter, United over Amtrack, privite colloage over public ect.
9a 100 years of data showing the government makes this run poorly
10. The source links do not back up this statement so have to skip this.
10a No, you do not have the right to the work of another human, unless your ok with slavery.
11. Government derives its income from taxes, if everyone works for the government who pays the taxes? Again see global unemployment data, there is a floor around 3-4% regardless of economic situation.
12. Didn’t vote for him, but sure words are words now show me an actual assault conviction we have a different conversation.
12a I have never seen him “treat” any woman unacceptably. Again words are words, suck it up buttercup
13. Profiling without cause is wrong regardless
14. The US also has a higher GPD per capita and living standard then the countries below it so what is the point here?
15. Its not it is a monotheistic judeo-christian one
15a I don’t’, and if the majority of people voted for the change sure.
16. I am pro innocent life. You kill, torture, rape. too bad.
17. If I am willing to pay higher taxers for the implanted form (most effective) for those who legitimately can’t afford it can we outlaw abortions in every case except rape, incest and life of mother?
17a You mean to suffer the consequences of their actions? Yes.
18. No, not a single person advocates for this, ever….
19. This is a BS chart. Actual 16% 2016 defense spending is here. http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/aug/17/facebook-posts/pie-chart-federal-spending-circulating-internet-mi/
20, right vs privilege, this one is talked to death
21. we should no argument here
21a I am for taking a rapist from his family to go to jail, I guess I hate families. No, get in line end of story.
22. 97% of the papers that took a position which is a 34% subset of the 12,000 of the oft cited John Cook book. This one is also beat to death so I will pass over it for now. The climate is changing, we just can’t definitively state why and how much CO2 is the tipping point is currently unprovable.
23. A, Not an argument, B jst don’t hurt people or take their stuff and were cool.
24. Depends on the person
25. Yes
26. same way people did before the welfare state, friends and the evil church
27. IL CCW passing potential saved my life 2 years ago
28. Other than raw identity politics and pandering can you cite sources?
Did I miss the answers you said you would provide?
Jay that is BS, this does not take into account that working classes do pay higher taxes, that comes in the form of sales tax that is not reported on income taxes on nearly EVERYTHING they buy. And they spend everything. maybe if the rich would not lowball the most vulnerable in our society and pay a living living wage and not send the poor to government assistance and the lower classes are they people who are the job creators. When the lower classes have money they spend it(while the rich invest and horde theirs overseas). When there is money in the economy our country flourishes. The lower classes put money into the economy which increases demand on local businesses who then increase hours hire more workers and promote workers to keep up with demand. This country privatizes profits and socialized the loses. Truth is the rich want a slave poor class because those are easily controled when their children are starving. What they refuse to acknowledge is that the pitchforks and torches are coming and the French Revolution may happen here eventually
Excellent!
Republicans I know would vehemently deny ever receiving help from the government (#25) because they don’t count things like the heft tax deductions offered for children, education, IRA’s, etc. But what’s more disingenuous is that they don’t count Medicare. One woman received treatment for breast cancer and thanks to government provided insurance she survived…but she still thinks Trump is the greatest and votes for the miserly Republicans in her state.
I see some disconnect here. It is awesome that people are replying to the questions by Elisabeth but they are using their own personal beliefs to answer them. That is not how they vote. If Republicans really voted on what they believe, they would vote democrat, because most democrats are center in USA, not left, and represent both sides. Democrats are pro-corporation while also balancing it with rights for people, providing some level of equal opportunity, and smart regulations. (Note that is different from Sanders who is left and an independent and only joined democrats for the election.)
Almost all republican politicians, however, show no balance at all. They use far right policies that created ISIS through the Iraq war, destroyed the country through deregulation that resulted in massive debt and the 2008 recession, they also put people in the EPA that want the EPA dismantled, people in science that believe in creationism, try to force Christian Laws on us, etc. The republican voters’ beliefs are not about such incompetence, yet they vote for it anyways. The questions by Elisabeth are essentially about all the things Republicans vote for. The fact that most republicans disagree with the questions (or even agree with democrats on the answers to most) is pretty telling that Republican voters are either misinformed (certainly possible given that Fox News is mostly fake news such as making people think 9/11 was caused by Iraq so that Bush could invade it) or they vote against their interests for some other reason.
I know you stand by your remarks, but that doesn’t make them any more true. I offered examples of how that is not true, but I suppose your certainty trumps that. Okay, I guess. Please offer some kind of proof for your assertions.
Interesting you find a lack of patriotism to be to blame instead of the perverse tax incentive that our government imposed. Listen, when a CEO is meeting with his board of directors, they aren’t discussing what is patriotic, they are discussing what is profitable. And, if you make it more profitable to keep money overseas, there should be no surprise what choice is made. Please offer some kind of proof for your assertions.
Lastly Glass-steagall is fun to blame for the financial crisis, but there is no proof of this. AIG, Lehmann, Bear Stearns and others were at the heart of the crisis, having made horrible investing decision. Yet, they would not have been subject to Glass-Stegall because they do not have both investment and commercioal banks. Further, a bank that WOULD have been subject to Glass-Steagall, JP Morgan, was so diversified that it came out on top after the crisis in great shape because it was diversified. So, please offer some kind of proof for your assertions.
Please.please.please. proof, reason, logic. Their great, trust me.
libertarian, i’ll chime in.
1. i’m not keen on either of these situations. it seems technically trump can choose to disclose this stuff? not that he should.
2. you’re ignoring the history, resources, economy, policies, etc. of all of these states, quite different from eachother, and ignoring all other factors and simply reducing things down to some political parties – parties who themselves don’t even look like they did 10 or 20 years ago. the conclusion you are starting from is that “republican policies result in people being poorer” – which i find is just you talking your own book and politics. i don’t think any honest objective look at these states and their history and situation would come to this blanket conclusion you have for your own politics and bias.
3. i’m fine with sensible regulation and limits on these things. you seem to ignore that profits evaporate when people are held liable for damages. or flint’s water situation seems to be largely a product of overall incompetence rather than malintent for profit.
4. i’m not sure exactly why or how many republicans are really against unions any more than they are seen as a pro-democrat voting block. i’d be happy with more unions and quite like the no minimum wage / strong private union situation in several european countries. however there should be a distinction drawn between private unions and public unions. i can avoid a private union or the results of them potentially, however i cannot in the case of a public union because it is likely that union is providing a monopoly service. for an example i will use a teacher’s union at a public school and the fact that, no matter what, my tax money will be going to this school and can not be opted elsewhere. i’m forced to pay/use it. that in and of itself doesn’t irk me enough to question a freedom of association and stopping it for a public offering, but what seem to be ridiculous situations a union like this seems to have garnered for itself does, for example, the process of firing a teacher seems rather onerous compared to virtually anyone else. sometimes when i point this out, even teachers will ask, but how do you measure a bad teacher? it seems some that should obviously be fired get shuffled around, and i don’t think the bad teacher question is so impossible to ask or determine. this is based on the exact same people even telling me that they know bad teachers or teachers that should be doing something else.
5. i don’t necessarily believe corporate tax cuts magically boost the economy and create jobs. although my bet is you believe the opposite, that high ones boost the economy and create jobs. you probably question the republican myth and embrace your progressive one, with equal evidence for both. jobs – real organic ones representing real growth in the economy – come largely from the efforts of capital in the hands of entrepreneurs and CEOs that know what to do with it. whether that is 1 or 100k person business or whether they are poor or rich. also where do you expect taxes to come from? they are just passed down onto whoever is buying the product, so let’s not pretend this is some direct line to taxing the wealthy.
6. i have no problem with progressive taxation. i have no problem with taxing wealthier people more than at present to pay for the size of government we’ve got, which certainly any skewing or favoritism falls more in their lap than the middle class or poor. i’d prefer reducing spending vs. raising taxes in general but really have no problem doing both to get things in line, particularly on the more extreme ends of income taxation. i do think middle/upper middle are, arbitrarily stating this, taxed enough, it’s just the quite wealthy that i think could be taxed more. although in real terms i’m not sure how much more money that would bring in either. i think our greater problems are not due to tax or revenue issues but to poor policies.
7. this seems too general to address and that it should involve specific examples to be debated on.
8. i don’t think anyone wants people to get sick and die and it’s dishonest and misrepresentative to insinuate they do just because they want to solve a problem diffrently than you. i don’t think obamacare, trumpcare, or what we had before are very well structured systems. i think those in other countries are misrepresented, misunderstood, and often romanticized themseles. there’s good and bad in ours and in all of theirs. i think we should be able to construct a system that combines all of these things, i don’t think anything we are doing now does that. i think a system is stupid if it ignores all of the market pressure available in those situations where it can be applied. i also think it’s foolish to treat insurance as a prepaid service rather than what insurance is actually designed for, addressing catastrophic risks.
9. what is the point about mentioning CEO pay here? if you want to ask a question specifically around that, go ahead. the way this question is written seems to imply that the private sector will always cost more, because it will cost x to provide a service anyway, and a profit of y will mean the private sector always costs x + y. that ignores the entire fiscal conservative, and real world, argument though – that x is not fixed or the same in both situations. generally speaking, private companies seek reduction of inefficiencies to make more profit. downward pressure on profit (margins) also result when companies fight over market share. what force exists for government, if it’s providing a monopoly service? there’s vastly less pressure to do things like iron out efficiciencies, or fight over market share or customers/users – those people always have to use you. and you can always just tax them more.
9a. depends on the services. i don’t think prisons should be run as for profit. schools, i don’t care – i like the idea of having a voucher and sending a kid anyway. public, private non profit, private for profit – i don’t care what it is, i’ll reward what is the best working option.
10. i’m not sure to whom this is even addressed to as it is written like an either/or question. if you want an answer as to why some prioritize the border, and security/terrorism as you noted, that it is based on fear in regards to terrorist acts exaggerating the real risks.
10a. no because i believe human rights are rights you have for just being human. so the right to say what i want is one, also a “negative right”, as it obliges inaction. i have it, the 1A just says the government is obliged to stay out of the way. every time i use this right, it also costs nothing. if i believe health care is a human right, then where is it coming from? if it’s a right i must be granted it, and some body is doing the granting, so it’s quite a bit different than freedom of speech. this is a “positive right” that requires action. it must be paid for and delivered to me, and each time it is used, it costs something. since i don’t believe human rights come from the government, and since i don’t believe i’m entitled to someone else’s labor, then i don’t believe health care is a human right. (or food, shelter, etc.) this is not to say that i don’t think we aren’t morally obligated as a people to provide them, and it’s not to say i even have a problem with government assisting where charity fails to provide. the difference really ends up being that the policies and structure of a system that i support would look much different than a system where it is perceived to be a right. i would rather give food stamps – cash for food progressively taxed from the wealthy – to the hungry that need it, rather than some “right”-based ration of food to all. i will structure a program to deal with the needs by directly taxing from the wealthy as best i can to help the poor be participants in the generally market based system we have; not create some fundamentally non-market based system that ignores the many benefits that come from a well running market.
11. the reality is there’s probably a lot of demand for jobs and a skillset mismatch. i would not mind the government assisting in re-training people for those jobs tha are available. i’m not opposed to a stimulus but i don’t want a pointless one like keynes hiring half the people to dig a hole and half to bury it. and i don’t want a porkulus to special interests. i would support one based on necessary infrastructure as it would lay the groundwork for organic growth in the private market, and real organic jobs the economy demands into existence, rather than temporary artificial government spending jobs.
12. he was imperfect but i voted for gary johnson. if gary did this i would think that he’s an asshole. although it would not have stopped me for voting for gary nor made me swing to hillary.
13. profiling how? what’s the efficacy of any profiling like this anyway? this feels more like you’ve asked it as a rhetorical question to get some people to go hmm gee i guess a crazy white man might whack me more than a brown muslim.
14. i don’t find this a useful point really. what is rich? how do people value their time and what they could be doing with it? working the same or as many hours as i do now, i’m not sure i could even enjoy my (middle class) car in half these countries. does this logic work further down the line? is spain richer than sweden, france, norway, or germany? aren’t we ignoring how different all these places are? things like tiny populations and great resource wealth in some of them? the only conclusive thing here is “working more hours doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll be wealthier” – but who claims it does?
15. it just has a lot of christians in it and christian history. i’m not religious and would like to see religious beliefs legislated in policy decline as they slowly seem to be.
16. not me
17. not me
18. no
19. i don’t think we do
20. as an IL resident i do need a FOID card. i don’t consider this problematic really. registration – when government knows where the guns are they can take them away. it’s been done in the past elsewhere and even here actually. good luck getting americans on board with this. i own a gun, i occasionally go out shooting with my brother in a buddy’s backyard. what do you think my premium should actually be calculated with actuarial science? a penny? note there is nra endorsed personal firearms liability insurance for private ranges, competition, and hunting available, as well as conceal carry insurance available. although the last one seems arguable that it should be compulsory, at some point the cost makes it a burden for poorer people to afford whereas you’d be denying them the option to carry.
21. because the government has chosen not to execute those laws.
21a. well they still broke the law. if no violent history i’d have no problem allowing them to stay but the path to citizenship should be just as difficult if not moreso. some kind of other residency status would be acceptable to me instead. we should still get ahold of controlling our borders better although i would not say with a big stupid wall.
22. you seem dishonest here. the 97% consensus stat is around it being caused by humans. major threat? it looks to be allowing us to be able to grow more crops and food, is that a major threat? at what rate and how disruptive will the changes take place? realistically speaking how much impact will changes we take now matter, and how much will they cost? those are the actual debates we should be having.
23. i’m not on board with these
24. the drug policy i would like to pursue is that of portugal.
25. no
26. n/a
27. you are asking fiscal conservative small government people for an example of a law written by their party to help them? people who don’t believe the role of the government is to personally help them, but to mostly stay out of the way and enforce things based around property rights at its core?
28. the drug war disproportionately harms blacks. plenty of republicans support it, because drugs are bad, mmkay? does that make them racist though? your logic seems poor.