Rasmussen is the most right wing of the major polling firms.
Many other polls get different results- its all in how you frame the questions.
Peddler cites 3 different polls- which vary.

J'oe cites only Rasmussen, as it consistently trends towards his opinions.

But- lets assume Rasmussen is 100% accurate-
out of the 58%, how many are complaining that the health care plan is too CONSERVATIVE?
Because a lot of the liberals in america, and I count myself among them, are against the Senate bill because it sold out to the insurance companies and big Pharma, who spent $600 Million dollars lobbying to get it watered down.

Rasmussen makes no claims that their 58% is all against it because its too liberal- and, in fact, most other polls show that the opposition is split roughly 60/40 between those who think its socialism, and those who are disgusted that its just more corporate business as usual.

So even if that poll is right, it doesnt exactly say what you might think it does.

If you read all the material you'd also know that the VAST majority of folks believe that under O'bama care, healthcare costs would INCREASE, and I agree.

I also think it best that we NOT filter all the money through bureaucracy of GOVERNMENT, since in every instance where we have done so with any manner of medical or social insurance, (medicare, medicaid, social security) government has mis-handled and mis-spent those funds to the point where our unfunded liabilities for those now living is somewhere between 50 and 100 trillion dollars and climbing. The aforementioned programs are broke, nearing insolvency. Bankrupt.

Our federal government has aptly demonstrated it's unsuitablility for such programs, but getting out would be nearly impossible now, since all those misapropriated funds have been collected and wasted. Getting us in any deeper, though, would be lunacy.

There are also issues of constitutionality and government control over our personal lives and things that liberals don't care anything about that also greatly affect the general population and that other people DO care about, but the money issue is near the top of the stack, even for liberals.....Joe

It is surprising that some people (Joe D.) keep proclaiming that no one wants any heath care reform. I really find it hard to believe, as you do (Peddler) that the American people don't want anything to be improved on that front. To hear the "right" tell it, you would think that everyone wants to get less coverage for more money. I am sure they will claim that this is Obama's goal, along with every other negative thing in the world.

Jeff

http://www.fordham.edu/images/academ...20election.pdf

Rasmussen did pretty good with the 08 presidential election. Oh wait - maybe Fordham has been infiltrated by "wingers". From what you guys are saying you would have thought Rasmussen would have skewed the data to rally the "wingers" to "rock the vote" so to speak.

I think people do want health reform, me included, just not what was being proposed. I think the Mass. election showed that, and this November will tell the rest of the story. And the politicians will follow the political winds of change so they can stay in power and keep liquidating the country and lining their pockets.

That is funny. Government control over our personal lives? You mean like warrantless wire taps? Anti-gay marriage? The good old boys have even been selling out the constitution on the second amendment (BRADY bill). (FWIW, I am fully aware of the dems criminal attacks on the 2nd amend. also) Neither party is the "freedom" party. REAL liberals aren't about restriction.

Jeff

WRT intelligence, you're dead right.

On competing with China, I think that eventually we'll automate a lot of those jobs out of existence too.

I have no idea WHAT we're going to do about those people who can't learn the skills that we're going to actually need to run our industrial society. I do see it as a looming problem, however. In the past, with the mechanisation of agriculture came the rise in industrial manufacturing, with the mines and transport needed to feed the raw materials. That absorbed the labour freed up (forced) from agriculture. Mines are highly automated and about 10 years ago, a company I was working for was running an autonomous truck software development effort. The trend is there. Shipping - a handful of people move huge amounts of cargo across oceans. It's possible to almost fully automate a ship, they run on autopilot with a feed from GPS most of the time anyway. Send out a pilot boat and put a crew on for the docking & undocking. Quite feasible but the cost saving probably isn't there and it'd be stupid not to have some maintenance people aboard.

It may be that we as a 1st World society is going to have to change what and how we look at employment and the things that can be purchased. I know that this verges on socialism and basically I'm a Libertarian, but still - what do you do when automation can produce a vast amount more goods than the population at large can afford to buy, because their purchasing power is shrinking? We aren't going to put a halt in our industrialisation, that's for sure.

As for the US health care debate, it probably seems as pointless to you as it does to me. Even with what's being proposed, it's still some 30 years behind what we have, which works far better for the vast bulk of the population.

PDW

There we go. Not crazy in the least to have a problem with the details of a complex plan as such.
As I said, however, others like to phrase it as if most Americans don't want health care reform of ANY kind. That is lunacy.
Glad to see that you understand what I mean.

Jeff

According to an article in "Automation World" online, the percentage of manufacturing jobs in both China and Brazil is declining..in Brazil by 20% ..all due,says the article. to automation. I would hazard a guess that this trend will continue.

One of my customers is a dairy farmer..he is, as ,we speak installing a automated milking parlor..all done by robots. I don't know all the details but he told me that once the installation is complete he can milk 65 cows and never set foot in the barn. He has a tractor that drives itself..once a human "shows" the tractor's computers what to do. Mind you, this is happening in a small hard scrabble farming community in northern Minnesota. Give technology a few more years to work out the bugs and you can imagine where this is all going.

When I first started work at my present day job we had two delivery trucks and three people in the office doing clerical work..today we have fourteen trucks and the same number of people in the office. Management has installed computers in the trucks and hopes to reduce the number of drivers in the near future.

This is all well and good, increased productivity is supposed to be a good thing BUT computers produce but can't consume. Multiply this trend worldwide and ten(or how many)fold and you should be able to see that we are going to have to find a different way to distribute the goods we are capable of producing.

So the average of $13,000.00 taking out of checks yearly to pay for employee health care and the expense of copays, additional insurance, pharmaceutical costs, refusals and copays aren't REAL money?
Are you also trying to tell us that healthcare costs WON'T increase if government does not get involved?
How do you make this stuff up, Joe? You seem rather intellegent. Can you not see the facts as they are and make up your own mind about issues?
The Limbaugh Letter is not an instruction manual for life. It's just out there to make an entertainer a few more bucks. This is America. It's okay to think for yourself.

IS there such a thing as a Limbaugh letter? I wouldn't know. I DO know that the government has blown every chance it ever had at providing insurance for much of anything, and if we go down this road, we can't just turn back.

You really can't show me where government has done anything but screw the pooch on insurance, or give me any reason to believe tht they will do anything different this time. I tend to reject entities that have demonstrated repeated and persistant failure as a track record, just as a personal quirk of mine. Mine and a lot of other people's.......Joe

Not everyone is brave enough.......

Under the much vaunted private industry, my health care costs have gone up every year since I can remember.
Currently $701 per month, for a $2500 deductible, for my family of 4.
Its gonna be hard to convince me that "Government" is going to worse- especially when the current health care proposal actually is not changing the balance between private insurance and government coverage much at all.

One reason J'oe may be out of touch about how efficient the private insurance industry is, is that, at least as far as he has said on this forum, he has no health insurance.
Running Bare, like that, means that if anything serious happens to him or his wife, WE PAY. Like, say Cancer, or a serious car crash that isnt his fault- any of the common, random, non-predictable things that can happen to any of us, and cost $400,000.

As I noted a while ago, I already pay for his roads and cops and Fire Departments- cause in my state, we only get back .88 cents on every dollar we send to the feds, while New Mexico gets something like $1.80 for every dollar they send in.

Its easy to complain about government largesse, when you reap the benefits of it, I guess.

As J'oe says, we cant show him anything-

But in reality, Social Security is more efficient, by far, than any private pension fund.
Overhead costs are a tiny fraction of even the cheapest no-load mutual fund.
What he talks about, when he discusses "failure" is the fact that we will need to raise payroll deductions (taxes) and probably lower benefits, on Social Security and Medicare, if we continue to let private insurers take 30% off the top.
Since its inception, Social Security has been changed around almost every year. So there is no standing target of debt in the future, of the umpty zillion dollars- there is only the current balance.

What many people dont seem to understand is that Social Security is NOT a savings account. There is no guarantee that you get back what you put in. It is a TAX. Always has been, always will be. From that tax, we pay Social Security, as needed by the recipients. How much you get has very little to do with what you put in, once you hit your lifetime max.

J'oe may not like Social Security, but to use his words, a Vast Majority of Americans do.

Joe,

I lie about nothing. I resent your accusation.

Your "side", on the other hand, does with no remorse, and are caught out by those on the other side.

"the VAST majority of folks believe that under O'bama care, healthcare costs would INCREASE, and I agree. "

Tonight, naturally on MSNBC, it was reported that one of the major health insurance providers announced a 34 % increase in premiums, even as the company announced record profit.

After rerun of the program, it was Anthem Health Care, and their profit increased last year eightfold

Our health care costs are still rising even with the threat of a bill being passed, and I, too, am unhappy with the way the Admin is knuckling under to the Reps. Most of the better parts of the original proposal have been stripped out.

Cost WILL go up, purely because all the cost containment plans are gone. It is a goody bag for business as usual.

The Government Option was the only alternative that would have been competition for the entrenched Insurance and Drug industry.

The Insurers have already predicted that your premiums will triple by 2019, and you know that your income will NOT, and you know that your employer will not eat that increase.

We now spend 17 % of our GNP on health care, 20 % predicted by 2012.

We all, including you, know that is unsustainable.

"government has mis-handled and mis-spent those funds to the point where our unfunded liabilities for those now living is somewhere between 50 and 100 trillion dollars and climbing."

"since all those misapropriated funds have been collected and wasted."

Government has, as per the Law, invested those funds in the only thing they were legally, US Treasuries, at 3 % permitted to. The actual monies have been spent, though the bonds held are claims on the full faith of the US Treasury.

That means the monies will have to be paid upon redemption, and the US populace will have to pay some more in taxes to pay for their redemption.

Bush DID say that those bonds were "just pieces of paper". They were not "just pieces of paper" when they were held by China and Japan and Arab nations. Those, we would happily honor. We were not trying to privatize them.

PDW,

"I have no idea WHAT we're going to do about those people who can't learn the skills that we're going to actually need to run our industrial society."

What "Industrial Society"? From what I read from you guys, your GDP is mainly mineral based, possibly, agricultural as a second, and Industrialization a distant third or farther.

Not a recidivist, but... there was a time when we had millions of handle turners making good product with an 8th grade education. They were capable of repetitive tasks.

I would be cautious of declaring those Chinese to be dumb and ignorant, who can only do the simplest tasks. Hundreds of thousands of them open their own manufactories, much as many here open shops who have less than enough education to do so, and make a success of it.

Our shame is that we have sent such as our appliance factories to Mexico where the Peons, uneducated people, can do the same job that our own "uneducated people" used to do. Thousands out of work here, profits rise, prices keep increasing.

See, the Country, indeed, the WORLD, is made up of people of "average" intelligence, with exceptions. The "average" person can be trained to do many tasks. Many tasks do not take a 130 IQ to do. Many, police for example, prefer under 110 for new hires. "Smarter" people leave the force, and that has been documented.

"Even with what's being proposed, it's still some 30 years behind what we have, which works far better for the vast bulk of the population."

I have not the slightest idea what that means. The proposal is 30 years BEHIND what we have? And it works BETTER?

250 to 260 million people have Insurance that costs too much, and 40 to 50 million have NO insurance, AND the cost is exorbitant for those who DO, and you say that the proposed legislation is 30 years BEHIND what we have?

Yes, if you think that we should have had a National Health Care plan 30 years ago, as we instituted Medicare, 45 years ago.

Peddler,

"The Limbaugh Letter is not an instruction manual for life."

And I think I have read that he is negotiating a new contract for 400 MILLION bucks. His last was, I think, 900 MILLION.

Are we, as a Nation, insane, not that this is a fed thing, but that Reps and Cons will pay such an insane amount for an "entertainer"?

Thru,

"Come on, George; a few posts back, Joe was a millionaire. Now he's a 'peon'?"

"And I'm feeling slighted, back a bit, I commented on a Serb Nationalist started this whole mess we're in, and you didn't even comment! Must be mellowing out in your old age.

My condolences on the weather up there."

Hell, the weather up here must be pleasant compared to how the area down there must be after winning the Super Bowl. 'Nother 8 inches or so expected, tomorrow. BFD. I don't have to go anywhere, long as I got beer and smokes.

I forget, right now, the name of the assassin who shot Franz Ferdinand. He was Serb in name only, since, at that time, Serbia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

My dad, born 1884, had citizenship papers with origin Austria-Hungary.

To bring this back on topic, I have no idea when the UMW got health care in their contract. I DO know that that was very fortuitous for my family. My dad was covered for all his medical care, as a UMW member. My mother, when she turned 60, or 62, was also covered.

No LIFE LIMIT as many insurers demand.

Oh, on Joe. On one hand he tells us how lucrative his business is, then he tells us he doesn't make NEARLY THAT much money, so you kinda wonder why he would defend million and billionaires.

HE declares that he is "well off" then tells us that he doesn't make nearly that much, BUT, he STILL wants the uber rich to pay as little as possible.

I simply do not understand why a person who makes a mediocre income would defend millionaires incomes, unless they STILL hope to get there.

Done for tonight.

Cheers,
George

George, I was referring to the First World. It does extend past the borders of the USA, though I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of people in the USA don't think so. The automation of jobs and displacement of labour is a common problem.

Quite right about our economy, though. We do have a reasonable services component however. Just not a lot of manufacturing.

Yes, no doubt. I don't dispute that for an instant. Just like once there were hundreds of yeoman and tenant farmers producing fine foodstuffs. However, those jobs are GONE. It's cheaper to buy a CNC machining centre or 2. In my last job one of my guys used to use Solidworks to design stuff, make a prototype out of plastic or aluminium, then make whatever it was out of stainless. After that we had the drawing and the machining files stored. If we ever needed another, load and go. We rarely made more than a couple of anything at one time as we were an R&D shop, the ratio of designers & machinists to widget output was pretty high. In industry, though? No. Keep multiplying that through all of manufacturing and where are the jobs for the average educated?

Those repetitive manufacturing jobs are not coming back any more than you're ever going to see people hand-planting rice or reaping grain with a sickle. Sure, someone can find an example of it somewhere, but nowhere on a commercial scale.

Personally I like old iron but I'd much rather work with a computer keyboard than stand in front of a lathe for 8 to 10 hours per day.

Not sure if this is meant for me, but for the record I don't think that the Chinese are dumb at all, and while *some* might be ignorant, ignorance is curable whereas stupidity isn't. The ignorant/dumb ones are those who think China will stay as a reservoir of cheap unskilled labour. It won't. Meanwhile, the First World, led by the USA, has given them the tools and demand to bootstrap from a agrarian/command economy to a 21C high tech economy in a single generation.

Hmmm, wonder if the cost of labour had anything to do with that.

Well, you see, I'm an Australian. 'We' means Australia in this instance. What you guys are arguing over WRT health insurance is inferior to what we had over 30 years ago. It's not like your population-wide health statistics are so great, either. Frankly I think the proposal sucks and would be better tossed out, with a better one put forward. This is one area where I think Joe is just flat wrong.

PDW

Here's a quick read for all you tax-and-spenders:
Jim Jubak: US can't grow its way out of deficit - MSN Money

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/20100...america-futurePage Not Found article is a long read but worth the time.

Here's some of your recovery money, "green jobs" real Jobs, going to China & other's overseas. *0% of them, by the way.

I saw this on TV, and no, it wasn't Fox telling half-truths and "out-of-context" quotes; it was from that other "Fox".....Diane Sawyer, on ABC News.

Green Stimulus Jobs Going to China? - ABC News

Blame this one on Bush & Haliburton.

From Ries;

"As I noted a while ago, I already pay for his roads and cops and Fire Departments- cause in my state, we only get back .88 cents on every dollar we send to the feds, while New Mexico gets something like $1.80 for every dollar they send in.

Its easy to complain about government largesse, when you reap the benefits of it, I guess."

Acting stupid ill becomes you, Ries, Especially since you are not.

As you already know, having been told repeatadly, New Mexico has a LOT of federal dollars flowing into it because it performs a LOT of services for the federal government. We have White sands missle range which does a lot for the military, a HOST of other military installations, sandia national labratories, many, many thousands of acres of both forest service and blm land where we fight fires, administer grazing, oil and natural gas leases and mining claims and a host of other programs that bring money INTO the federal coffers. That money, by the way, goes DIRECTLY into the national coffers and does not pass "GO" as it leaves the state. I know because I have written a lot of those checks to the feds myself. In my part of the state, you can't drive a rural hiway for more than a few miles without seeing a million dollars worth of men and equipment doing drug and wetback interdiction for the whole country, and one only sees a tiny protion of everything that's going on, I find, when I leave the road.

You might also want to learn about Playas, a complete town leased to the department of homeland security for training purposes. About 20 miles down the road from me. Once again, fed. dollars coming into the state for services rendered to the whole country.
As for your paying for our fire departments, not likely. Fire departments in New Mexico, at least the rural ones, which are, of course, the majority, are financed by New Mexicans. A portion of their homeowner's insurance premiums go to a "kitty" which finances rural departments. (yeah, horrible private insurance companies).

NOT that I hold New Mexico up as some conservative haven, because it is not. Lots of welfare dollars coming into the state, I'm sure. Since it is a democratic stronghold, I'm not sure why that should have anything to do with me, though. I have no reigional loyalties except to the USA.

From George;

"I lie about nothing. I resent your accusation."

Then stop saying things you know not to be true. You said I do not want the billionares to pay ANY income tax, and I have told you time after time that that is not a fact. They will be paying MORE income and CG tax if we lower the rate and plug the loopholes as has been done in the past.

You state;

"Oh, on Joe. On one hand he tells us how lucrative his business is, then he tells us he doesn't make NEARLY THAT much money, so you kinda wonder why he would defend million and billionaires.

HE declares that he is "well off" then tells us that he doesn't make nearly that much, BUT, he STILL wants the uber rich to pay as little as possible.

I simply do not understand why a person who makes a mediocre income would defend millionaires incomes, unless they STILL hope to get there."

Show me where I ever said I was "well off" and I'll kiss your ass in front of the Rodeo post office at high noon and give you a half hour to draw a crowd. "well off" to me means wealthy. Never have been, never felt particularly motivated to become that way. Show me where I ever used that phrase in refferance to myself, or apologise for misrepresenting what I said, or at least don't do it again.

My life is pretty comfortable and easy going and I like it that way. Not many wealthy people I know can make that claim. And so, in my mind, that makes me the winner! No reason to be jealous at all.

If you guys think that production of wealth (and tax revenues) have not been affected by fear of all the wacky programs proposed by this aministration, you need to think again, and if you think that government is so good at insurancee programs, you need to look at the trustee's report over the last few years. Here's the latest;

Trustees Report Summary

They are past due by a long shot to start cutting bennys and raising rates, but congress, typically, lacks the balls for the job. Bush repeatedly warned them over the last couple of years to no avail.

THAT, is the difference ( among others) between governmment and private. Government is always willing to sweep the mess under the rug until another administration is forced to deal with it. That buck can't be passed many more times until it comes home to roost. Eat, drink and be merry, guys! you might luck out and die before you have to face your kids and tell them you helped bankrupt their future so you could live a little easier.

For the record, I don't LOVE OR HATE the rich. They can't stop me from making a product and selling it any more than they can stop you. I don't dabble in things that involve challenging other people's superior skills and capital. That's only common sense.

If they are taking simple metalworking jobs to china, better not try to make the same stuff here. Again, common sense. You guys claim everybody would prefer American made, and I agree! FINE, go make something! Rush Limbaugh is not going to show up and burn your shop down.

I bought a new gun the other day, and the owner saw my business card and was all over me to make a bunch of parts in small quantities and I turned him down because I don't do custom orders of any kind. There is business out there! All kinds of specialty business that you will never find by calling on each other. Yeah, some of it may require that you work too cheap in the beginning until you get your speed up and do short runs. until you can proove sales. SO WHAT? It's money, and you won't have any millionares competing for it

I don't know, guys. It really pains me to see so many so upset because rich folks won't do as much for them as they think should be done. We're not on a plantation any more, and nobody is going to take care of us. If taxes are too low for the top- half, keep in mind that the bottom half barely pays any at all. Really, really something wrong with all this hatred for those who have done well. I think they are pretty handy, myself......Joe

Sounds like New Mexico wouldn't have an economy at all without the Federal Government.

You guys in NM must pay higher rates for lease and royalty payments to the Fed than we do in Coloraodo. For what people extract or use of Federal resources and the profits made, the government gets little or nothing above the taxpayer cost for managing the resources.

The Natural Gas industry here is well noted for shortchanging royalty payments to the Fed and always in the news with audits finding corporate payments under contracted terms. The worst last year were several energy corporations in Denver caught smoozing the Feds with girls, booze and drugs to lower extraction royalties totals and on-going for years of the previous decade according to audits related in the Denver Post.