patrick.net

Ha..." The party stands for smaller government, far less federal spending, individual freedom, less intrusion, a strong national defense, lower taxes and supply-side, business-friendly economics. Far more than half of America believes in just the same tenets: Make no mistake, the nation is still solidly center-right."

Yet, the party denies rights based on personal sexual preference, and pushes to deny women the rights to preserve physical autonomy.

So, maybe I'll make the mistake..the country is not center-right, and the article is built on shaky truisms.

thomaswong.1986 says

i hardly would call a 48% as a massacre..

Obama is the first President to be elected and re-elected with these margins since Ike. That's impressive.

121212 says

curious2 says

That would mean reversing Roe v Wade to allow states to prohibit abortion, so it might corral enough religious fundamentalists to win, but it wouldn't prohibit abortion outright, so it might not energize opposition.

NO!

The repupkes need to move away from SOCIAL ISSUES, it's the SOCIAL ISSUES that is sinking the party. They are FOOLS! They cannot see the shit on the edge of their own noses.

The continuing party platform is to Ban gay marriage, Ban Abortion, ban contraceptive, trans vaginal ultrasounds and the end of the REPUBLICANS PARTY as we know it.

You are spot on!!

And they should support universal healthcare if they are serious about helping small businesses.

CL says

Obama is the first President to be elected and re-elected with these margins since Ike.

And he's the first Democrat to win a majority twice since FDR. But he's also the first President in American history to get re-elected with fewer votes than he got the first time. Going into the election, his approval rating was at or below 50%. The 10 million drop that thomaswong.1986 mentioned shows that people are unhappy with current policies (e.g. Obamacare, which polls around -10%), but not so crazy as to embrace Republican theocracy.

I agree with 121212 and Peter P that Republicans should move away from social issues, but I don't see that happening. They have climbed up that dying tree and they don't know how to climb down. That's why I think they'll try to split the baby, i.e. campaign on states' rights, so they can campaign on social issues in the Bible belt without getting clobbered everywhere else. I don't know if that will work for them either, but it avoids the pain of admitting they're wrong on every level, and most people try to avoid pain.

They'd be better off dissolving the GOP and starting up the Whigs again. The brand name is polluted for years. Arthur Anderson was known for the Enron scandal, so they rebranded as Accenture.

50% of the country should dissolve?
"Why don't you people just go HOME!"

"Because we ain't got no where else to go..."

I am no raving liberal, I believe in the rule of law, equally for everyone.

If anything the hypocritics of all politics blows my mind.

I am no liberation, I am no hard right conservative, I am no hard left liberal.

I am neither left or right , I am either up or down.

Help me, I am looking for the Republicans to come to their senses!

You leave the people with no choice with this Platform.

There is so much on the conservative side that would help us, how do we get to the top of BULLSHIT MOUNTAIN!

So is someone going to get a clue?

No, instead we are going for the Three-PEAT in March 2013.

Fiscall Cliff threat part 2
Sequester threat part 3
Debt Limit Cliff threat part 2

Your side is breaking the government decision making process apart at the seams with no option but austerity, European style austerity, how does that make any sense?

In the Uk they have adopted craziness lowering capital gains, income taxes on the rich, lowering seniors benefits to pay for it! and much much more austerity on students and more.

This is causing the UK to face another recession, it's 3rd since 2008. It does not work.

WE NEED HIGHER JOB GROWTH, PASS THE BILLS AND GET IT DONE!

It solves a whole heap of short, middle term government issues from increased revenue and greater consumer confidence.

This is not hard, create more vocational education directed towards an education that works for YOU! You wonder how Germany does it, look at it's Schools for 16 year olds.

It's not by accident that Germany manufactures shit, they planned and created jobs to fill the auto industry.! NOT OUTSOURCING!

curious2 says

I agree with 121212 and Peter P that Republicans should move away from social issues, but I don't see that happening.

Sure. They can embrace the Democratic positions, and lose the voters that crave what they've left behind. The old adage is that, if given a choice of {Party} and {Party-lite} they'll choose the real one every time. The GOP is screwed...hoisted on their own petards.

curious2 says

The 10 million drop that thomaswong.1986 mentioned shows that people are unhappy with current policies

Or, that the economy is still in trouble, people are in pain and that Obama was given all of our goals and aspirations and was expected to solve them all in his first term. I suspect as the economy improves, all of those numbers will too.

CL says

They can embrace the Democratic positions, and lose the voters that crave what they've left behind.

They can have the same positions for certain issues. They do not need to oppose each other for everything.

Let's give the GOP Utah and be done with it. They can all go live with baby Jesus and his army of fat white guys in camouflage defending their god given right to subjugate poor minority homosexual atheists.

Peter P says

CL says

They can embrace the Democratic positions, and lose the voters that crave what they've left behind.

They can have the same positions for certain issues. They do not need to oppose each other for everything.

Yeah, except that's not the way politics works. If there is a constituency out there, they want representation. They vote and get like-minded people to run for the office. There is a reason that the GOP embraced racists, misogynists, and so on in the past. There is (or at least, was) electoral gold to be mined there.

The races are won in the margins many times. Can they abandon the nativists and gain hispanic or black votes at a rate that renders the need for the nativists obsolete? That's for the part leaders to calculate.

I suspect the answer is no, because when elections get tight, they fall back on those positions every time.

121212 says

tatupu70 says

thomaswong.1986 says

and GOP ranks can only increase in coming years.

With which demographic foolish imp? Hey, wake up delusional Republican fool this is why you cannot win the White House. You cannot gerrymander the districts for President! You have no more increasing demographics, NONE!

Dude - you really think the Liberals have a strong and durable coalition of:

- Single mothers
- Minorities
- Welfare recipients
- Young and stupid
- Unions

I think it is safe to say that our country will have to be even in worse shape if we have more single mothers (and guaranteed poverty) welfare recipients and dopey college kids with no jobs and a mountain of debt.

Seriously, doesn't it mean that the Democrats are a total failure if their constituency grows in the coming decades?

121212 says

Your side is breaking the government decision making process apart at the
seams with no option but austerity, European style austerity, how does that make
any sense?

In the Uk they have adopted craziness lowering capital gains, income taxes on
the rich, lowering seniors benefits to pay for it! and much much more austerity
on students and more.

This is causing the UK to face another recession, it's 3rd since 2008. It
does not work.

There has been no austerity in Europe. Certainly no austerity in the US.

We just raised taxes on "the rich" and we are still trillions in debt. We will never get more than 18-20% of GDP in taxes. Yet our government spending is 24% of GDP and growing.

Not hard math dude. We either need to tax the shit out of EVERYONE to pay for this big government that 51% of the population apparently wants. Or we are going to have to cut spending. Either way, you, the poor and the rich are going to feel the pain. Either in increased taxes or reduced services.

Pick your poison.

Then again, we could follow former Enron-advisor Paul Krugman's advice and mint a trillion dollar coin.

socal2 says

this big government that 51% of the population apparently wants.

We don't want big government. We can cut the Pentagon by a whole lot and that majority you mentioned will be quite happy.

CL says

We can cut the Pentagon by a whole lot....

Perhaps, but even reducing it to zero would not balance the budget.

The current deficit exceeds $1T/year. Not coincidentally, federal medical spending (Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare) also exceeds $1T/year, and is the biggest single category. You can't balance the budget without reducing medical spending, unless you increase annual taxes by $4k/person to pay for it.

The trend is in the opposite direction though. Obamacare increases federal medical spending, in addition to increasing total national medical spending. Whether the Obamacare taxes will exceed the spending remains to be seen, but most people doubt it, and in this instance I think most people are right.

Tim Aurora says

I get the point but in 2013 the estimated deficit is exactly the same as estimated defense budget.

Whose estimates? Everything I've seen puts the deficit at nearly twice the defense budget. The only category that adds up to as much as the deficit is medical spending (Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare).

socal2 says

We will never get more than 18-20% of GDP in taxes

dogmatic belief not fact in evidence. Other countries -- countries with AAA credit ratings still -- get double that.

curious2 says

Everything I've seen puts the deficit at nearly twice the defense budget

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/FDEFX

that would be $1.6T

your data is bad

Tim Aurora says

SS costs need to be reigned

SS has very little cost to rein in.

Now, if you want to cut SS benefits, screw you, LOL

curious2 says

The trend is in the opposite direction though. Obamacare increases federal medical spending, in addition to increasing total national medical spending.

this is very true. PPACA is very troublesome from a budget standpoint. Many families are going to get $10,000/yr insurance subsidies. I don't think this is going to be paid for by the law's tax rises, either, though they will bring in a bit more money from the 1% now.

$50B a year in revenue:

http://www.heritage.org/~/media/Images/Reports/2011/01/wm3100_table1_750px.ashx

Bellingham Bill says

your data is bad

Even your link showed a deficit of $1.1T, which is around 70% of $1.6T. I said "nearly," which might be somewhat more than your link (which is based on White House data) but is consistent with other estimates.

Bellingham Bill says

SS has very little cost to rein in.

True, Social Security operates quite efficiently. If we have a choice between subsidizing Social Security vs subsidizing Medicare, I'd rather subsidize Social Security and let the recipients decide for themselves how to spend the money. FDR said Social Security should protect people from having to worry about going hungry in their old age, an affordable goal that I support; Medicare is a totally different story.

I agree about Medicare.

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/W824RC1

As long as the SSTF has money in it SS doesn't need any subsidization, FICA payers just need their damn bonds they were made to collectively buy 1989-2009 paid on.

When the Republican Party starts another currency that is tax-free, the Democratic Party will self-destruct.

^ good luck with that

The Red State Socialism chart demonstrates how each State ranks at managing their Federal spending and showing a profit. Where is the glamour in being on the bottom of this chart?

Bellingham Bill says

socal2 says

We will never get more than 18-20% of GDP in taxes

dogmatic belief not fact in evidence. Other countries -- countries with AAA credit ratings still -- get double that.

Double that? Really? Which countries?

How much would taxes have to go up on EVERYONE in America to get where you think we need to go?

socal2 says

Double that? Really? Which countries?

Example, Sweden. Hardly a "commie gulag hellhole".

How far will they have to go DOWN before we achieve Perfect Freedom?

Afghanistan has very low tax vs GDP. Also Angola, Algeria, Congo, Iran.

This notion that endlessly cutting taxes will sooner or later lead to Utopia..... doing the same thing over and over and expecting better results next time is one definition of insanity.