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Thread: Political/Cultural Chit-Chat

  1. #211
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    I could be wrong, but I don’t think Clayton Christensen advocates a more government-controlled healthcare program like single-payer or Medicare for all. I don’t have his book with me, but I’ll check.
    I remember his quote being that the ACA was a good start, but didn't go far enough, and "autocratic leadership" was needed to break resistant high cost structures.

    Being familiar with Christensen's work & background, I didn't interpret that to mean we should move to single payer, but rather he was echoing many who thought the ACA was too narrowly focused on insurance coverage, and didn't address other systemic issues. My assumption was he was referring to fairly radical private moves on the provider side, like what Intermountain is doing in Utah, or what Amazon is looking at, Walmart, etc.

    If we ever get back to seriously discussing policy as a nation, what are the credible conservative ideas on how to improve healthcare, while keeping coverage of pre-existing conditions, etc? My impression is Republicans are thankful to not have to talk about healthcare.

  2. #212
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ma'ake View Post
    I remember his quote being that the ACA was a good start, but didn't go far enough, and "autocratic leadership" was needed to break resistant high cost structures.

    Being familiar with Christensen's work & background, I didn't interpret that to mean we should move to single payer, but rather he was echoing many who thought the ACA was too narrowly focused on insurance coverage, and didn't address other systemic issues. My assumption was he was referring to fairly radical private moves on the provider side, like what Intermountain is doing in Utah, or what Amazon is looking at, Walmart, etc.

    If we ever get back to seriously discussing policy as a nation, what are the credible conservative ideas on how to improve healthcare, while keeping coverage of pre-existing conditions, etc? My impression is Republicans are thankful to not have to talk about healthcare.
    Here’s a set of ideas from the Heritage Foundation. >10 years old but typical:

    https://www.heritage.org/health-care...ush-healthcare

    One more:

    https://www.heritage.org/health-care...-conservatives

    I don’t think ideology-based solutions will work in the USA.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  3. #213
    Best healthcare plan I ever had got nixed by Obamacare. High deductible plan coupled with an HSA. $10k deductible by low ultilizers like us were able to sock away a ton of cash that rolled over.

    Now I have a $13.5k deductible, no HSA, and costs about 3x what I used to pay. Good news though, preventive care visits once a year are "free" and if we decide to have kids again, a medical wonder, that'll also be covered.

    I'll take my $7000 a year back thank you.

    All complaining aside, that sort of plan really was a good way to reduce healthcare costs. We had incentive to ask for alternative treatments, generic prescriptions and be overall healthier and better utilizers. The payoff was the money we saved in an HSA could earn interest and be applied to our retirement.

    I've been critical of Obamacare in the sense that it did little to improve healthcare utilization nor reward healthy living. I think that is a core component to any legit healthcare reform, and a key way to do that in my estimation is to have people feel the real cost of care, something most of us are shielded from.




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  4. #214
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    The Healthy Americans Act. This is a the best idea that got nowhere. It was a truly bipartisan bill. Bob Bennett told me that the Obama White House came to him and Wyden and wanted to support their bill, but for political reasons the “public option” insurance concept must be added. Bennett refused because he knew he’d lose all his GOP co-sponsors if he added a government health insurance entity that would compete with private companies. Eventually the pubic option was removed from the bill that became Obamacare. Oh well, that’s how history sometimes takes weird turns.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Healthy_Americans_Act

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  5. #215
    Working at a place where I see so, so many people who are suffering, some because of poor life style choices or a lack of knowledge of their own genetics that might have motivated them to head off what they're struggling with now... I've become much more of a health fanatic than I ever imagined I would be.

    And I'm fortunate to be exposed to some of the latest research on diet, exercise, and other health practices, with MDs and PhDs in the field as colleagues who are similarly motivated to avoid problems that can be navigated around. Many colleagues are from nations where treatments or prevention have been followed for thousands of years. Example: the spices Indians have in their daily lives are thought to be a major reason India has low rates of Alzheimers.

    Easily, 25% of US healthcare costs could be shaved off by better lifestyle choices. Sodas are 21st century cigarettes, many people eat horrible food, we largely ignore wisdom from the East that can make a big difference. Much of the poor lifestyle choices are a result of economic inequality.
    McDonalds, KFC, Taco Bell, pizza are toxic "comfort foods".

    People in many poorer countries lead happier, healthier lives even though they don't have access to high quality healthcare, in large part because they have "hope", they're not driven to medicate themselves with crappy diets or poisons, stress that originates with striving to keep up with the Joneses or dealing with a job that treats them like they're expendable.

    One guy at our work is a solid, blue collar employee who never calls in sick, has been with us for a couple of years. He used to work at a potato chip factory across town where the policy was no vacations between Memorial Day & Labor Day. "But that's the time of year our kids aren't in school". Answer: "If you don't like it, get another job". He finally did, "hit the jackpot" and is doing menial work tasks for us. He's a great guy, but is a good example of how the genetic / upbringing lottery is largely cruel. He knows that MRI, CT scans, PET and other types of Radiology are "cameras looking into your body" but otherwise, investing in lots of education in him is not going to result in somebody producing keen insights. This doesn't mean he's "expendable".

    We plateaued on increasing life expectancies and have gone down a couple of years in a row due in large part from opioids, which are an escape. The fast food places have experimented with healthier menus, but people crave the comfort food that helps relieve their stress from the day, the same food that sends them to hospitals years or decades later for expensive and often futile treatments.

    In healthcare we often see the end product of a culmination of low scores on the genetic lottery, raised in dysfunctional homes & neighborhoods, crappy & turbulent jobs, and lots of self medicating through bad diet, escaping the day on the couch, smoking, drinking, drugs, etc.

    Taking a holistic view of what constitutes good health, we're going to have very expensive healthcare for the foreseeable future.

  6. #216
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Ma'ake, as I read Christensen's book I see him advocating for systemic change in health care business models, not really talking about Medicare-Medicaid-health insurance reform, etc. Here's a typical statement of his from an interview back in 2010:

    "What they are doing to this point in Washington is not even focused on the reform of health care,” states Christensen, who recently penned The Innovator’s Prescription. Care itself has to be truly reformed, he warns, or “America will just go bankrupt" struggling to pay the costs related to it.Many participants at the World Healthcare Congress acknowledged that it was up to the private sector to reform and disrupt -- to reference Christensen’s famous disruptive innovation model of economics -- the industry's approach to care from the bottom up. Companies like Virgin HealthMiles, which incentivizes healthy living with cash and prizes, and Alere, which focuses on connecting people with their caregivers through technology, have already begun stepping up to fill the care gap.

    While the potential for true healthcare reform may now lie in the private sector, Christensen and others note that there are still many government-based regulations and pricing practices that will need to be changed for this to happen.

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/face-to-face/2010/04/28/what-obamacare-is-missing/#6f6ad46d3326

    This is from a fascinating article about Clayton's own experiences with a heart attack, stroke and cancer, all in a three-year period while he was writing The Innovator's Prescription:

    His book The Innovator's Prescription (2009) was co-written with two doctors, the late Jerome Grossman, who ran Tufts Medical Center for 16 years, and Jason Hwang, a former student of Christensen's. Hwang contributed enormously to this story.The authors acknowledge that the fee-for-service reimbursement system, in which providers earn more by treating patients more aggressively, impedes the kind of disruptive innovation that would lead to better care at a lower cost. There are several systems we could adopt that would be better, but there isn't a road map to get there. The business models of health are frozen in the hospital and the doctor's office. The path to fixing the system is to disrupt those models. Here are some approaches:

    Routinization. A hospital is really three business models under one roof, each of which manages a different type of medical practice. Intuitive medicine is the realm of highly trained specialists handling difficult diagnoses and treatment. Empirical medicine is the costly realm of chronic care and trial-and-error treatment. Precision medicine, the real goal for the system, is a case where diagnosis is known and so is the therapy. Then treatment can be routinized and moved off-site. Disruption will involve pushing more of medicine into the precision category, then automating that care to make it better and cheaper.


    Consolidation. The best way to unleash disruption is if more health care providers combine, controlling hospitals, doctors and health insurance. Christensen makes an analogy to RCA in the 1950s. To get people to watch the first color programming on its NBC channel, RCA also had to manufacture color TV sets. A hospital loses money if it tells patients to go to an outside cheaper clinic. But if it owns the health plan and the clinic, disruptive ideas will flourish.


    Precision. The kind of targeted therapies now used in cancer treatment, such as the drug Christensen received, will be applied more widely. Diseases will be subtyped more specifically and therapies tailored to work better. This will also save time and money as clinical drug trials become more focused. Specialty clinics will arise to implant devices more cheaply.


    Do-it-yourself. Christensen predicts a rise in self-diagnosis and self-care, as tools that used to be stuck in the hospital reach patients and their families.

    https://www.forbes.com/forbes/2011/0314/features-clayton-christensen-health-care-cancer-survivor.html#2da414fda4db

    I recommend the entire article. Am I the only one here who remembers when Clayton Christensen was an all-state basketball player at West High? I think I was in junior high at the time. Most of you probably weren't even born yet.


    Last edited by LA Ute; 02-06-2019 at 08:56 AM.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  7. #217
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    This is a bit heated but she does make a point:

    “Does anyone think that either one of these jokers, Northam or Herring, would be accorded any courtesy by the media if they were Republicans. No. There would be special theme songs on cable and network news, there would be special graphics, there would be people interviewing every person that ever went to school with these blackfacers. They would be parked outside their residences, following relatives around, going through trash, confrontations by angry activists captured on video, think of the Kavanaugh confirmation hearing as a paradigm. Why aren’t we seeing this?”

    https://pjmedia.com/blog/liveblogeve.../entry-252696/

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  8. #218
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    This is a bit heated but she does make a point:

    “Does anyone think that either one of these jokers, Northam or Herring, would be accorded any courtesy by the media if they were Republicans. No. There would be special theme songs on cable and network news, there would be special graphics, there would be people interviewing every person that ever went to school with these blackfacers. They would be parked outside their residences, following relatives around, going through trash, confrontations by angry activists captured on video, think of the Kavanaugh confirmation hearing as a paradigm. Why aren’t we seeing this?”

    https://pjmedia.com/blog/liveblogeve.../entry-252696/
    A factor that I think we are seeing with the media that should be considered and trumps (pun mostly intended) any discussion about 'liberal media bias' is that the media are smart people and also citizens of this nation. Just like all of us, they can see how toxic Trump really is and how important it will be to get him out of office, and so I do think there is an element of standing down a bit when it comes to opponents to Trump (and the party the associate with) and jumping on allies of Trump (and the party they associate with).

    I'm not saying that is right, but I think it is reality that goes beyond simply 'bias'. Put yourself in those shoes and I think it is a force that even the most ethical and balanced journalist would wrestle with.

  9. #219
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    This is a bit heated but she does make a point:

    “Does anyone think that either one of these jokers, Northam or Herring, would be accorded any courtesy by the media if they were Republicans. No. There would be special theme songs on cable and network news, there would be special graphics, there would be people interviewing every person that ever went to school with these blackfacers. They would be parked outside their residences, following relatives around, going through trash, confrontations by angry activists captured on video, think of the Kavanaugh confirmation hearing as a paradigm. Why aren’t we seeing this?”

    https://pjmedia.com/blog/liveblogeve.../entry-252696/
    I have seen a fair amount of stuff--interviews with or quotes from classmates, yearbook editors, etc., especically now that the lt. gov.'s accuser has come forward. Part of the difference in intensity is that these are state officeholders, not a Supreme Court nominee during hearings. Also that Northam admitted it initially, as did the atty general, so there isn't the sleuthing to prove them liars as there was with Roy Moore or Kavenaugh (or Gary Hart or John Edwards or Jeff Bezos). We will see what happens with the Lt. gov. going forward.
    Last edited by concerned; 02-07-2019 at 10:20 AM.

  10. #220
    https://twitter.com/conservmillen/st...513114625?s=19

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    "Be a philosopher. A man can compromise to gain a point. It has become apparent that a man can, within limits, follow his inclinations within the arms of the Church if he does so discreetly." - The Walking Drum

    "And here’s what life comes down to—not how many years you live, but how many of those years are filled with bullshit that doesn’t amount to anything to satisfy the requirements of some dickhead you’ll never get the pleasure of punching in the face." – Adam Carolla

  11. #221
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    The Catholic diocese in Kentucky that sponsors the Covington boys’ school hired an investigating agency to review the incident in D.C. Here is the agency’s report.

    https://www.covdio.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/CCHFinalInvestigativeReport.pdf

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  12. #222
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    The Catholic diocese in Kentucky that sponsors the Covington boys’ school hired an investigating agency to review the incident in D.C. Here is the agency’s report.

    https://www.covdio.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/CCHFinalInvestigativeReport.pdf
    If I hired an investigator and this is what they came up with, I would be tempted to not pay them.

  13. #223
    Quote Originally Posted by UTEopia View Post
    If I hired an investigator and this is what they came up with, I would be tempted to not pay them.
    Unless it's exactly what you want them to come up with.

  14. #224
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    I don't think you guys are being fair. But the Sandmann kid might sue. I hope he doesn't -- this thing needs to die, but that would enable a full record to be developed.

    Here's what that right-wing rag, the Washington post, reported the story.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/natio...=.2da8e00f8c3a

    I think Phillips, the guy who was beating the drum, deserves more skpeticism than the kids. The guy has claimed he served in Vietnam but he never did. Big credibility shot right there.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  15. #225
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    This is the video Sandmann's lawyer put it. He'll show it to the jury if there's a trial. I'm sure that attorneys and publicists for the 54 celebrities, news organizations and pundits who received document preservation letters from Sandmann's attorney will review this video closely. See how fair you think the news media coverage was.



    I don't expect a trial but there may be written apologies and perhaps some money will change hands. I think they defamed him. Sandmann deserves something. Otherwise, this incident will dog him for his entire life.
    Last edited by LA Ute; 02-14-2019 at 12:47 PM.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  16. #226
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    This is the video Sandmann's lawyer put it. He'll show it to the jury if there's a trial. I'm sure that attorneys and publicists for the 54 celebrities, news organizations and pundits who received document preservation letters from Sandmann's attorney will review this video closely. See how fair you think the news media coverage was.




    I don't expect a trial but there may be written apologies and perhaps some money will change hands. I think they defamed him. Sandmann deserves something. Otherwise, this incident will dog him for his entire life.
    Sandmann said he was defusing the situation. I've never seen someone defuse a situation with that type of stance and smirk. I don't know what the kid thought he was doing, but he seems pretty proud of himself.

  17. #227
    Quote Originally Posted by UTEopia View Post
    Sandmann said he was defusing the situation. I've never seen someone defuse a situation with that type of stance and smirk. I don't know what the kid thought he was doing, but he seems pretty proud of himself.
    Did you watch that video? It seems to show him laughing with his friends unaware of what is going on as Phillips approaches. When he targets Sandmann he stands there and smiles. Sometime after, a native American man accompanying Phillips begins to argue with another (presumably) student. It doesn't show what started the argument, but it does show Sandmann turning from Phillips who is still drumming in his face to get the other student to be quiet and to stop arguing.

    He's a kid, about every kid I know that age is pretty awkward. And in light of that additional detail, I personally believe he is telling the truth. If nothing else he shows that he was trying to get another person around him to at least stop arguing if not to be quiet while Phillips was beating his drum.

    If you are curious about that portion of it, you can see it at minute 6:33 or by clicking this link: https://youtu.be/lSkpPaiUF8s?t=393

  18. #228
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    I don't think you guys are being fair. But the Sandmann kid might sue. I hope he doesn't -- this thing needs to die...…..
    I've seen a lot of video and I've yet to see a single shred of video or audio evidence that he was disrespecting, antagonizing or impeding Phillips. This kid comes out smelling like a rose IMO. I know nothing about libel/slander law (or any law for that matter), but, if the evidence is as it appears, I hope the kid cleans up.
    “Children and dogs are as necessary to the welfare of the country as Wall Street and the railroads.” -- Harry S. Truman

    "You never soar so high as when you stoop down to help a child or an animal." -- Jewish Proverb

    "Three-time Pro Bowler Eric Weddle the most versatile, and maybe most intelligent, safety in the game." -- SI, 9/7/15, p. 107.

  19. #229
    Quote Originally Posted by UTEopia View Post
    Did you read what I said? Sandmann said he was defusing a situation. What situation was he defusing?
    My understanding from what I've read (though I haven't watched the video):

    Multiple protesters were trying to provoke a reaction out of the MAGA hat kids. Sandmann was trying to prevent that from happening by not responding and just standing with a stupid grin. Ironic that in trying to prevent a reaction, he became the reaction that the protesters were going for.

  20. #230
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Trouble in progressive paradise.

    New York Governor Cuomo blasts AOC and left-wing Democrats for 'putting political interests above community' and driving away Amazon - despite polls showing most people supported tech giant's new HQ

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-New-York.html

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  21. #231
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    Trouble in progressive paradise.

    New York Governor Cuomo blasts AOC and left-wing Democrats for 'putting political interests above community' and driving away Amazon - despite polls showing most people supported tech giant's new HQ

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-New-York.html

    Ha. This is like Lebron ready to sign on the dotted line with the Jazz and management allowing Tyler Cavanaugh to run him off. "Your stinkin' championships will raise the price of tickets!!" AOC is a cluster for the Dems.
    “Children and dogs are as necessary to the welfare of the country as Wall Street and the railroads.” -- Harry S. Truman

    "You never soar so high as when you stoop down to help a child or an animal." -- Jewish Proverb

    "Three-time Pro Bowler Eric Weddle the most versatile, and maybe most intelligent, safety in the game." -- SI, 9/7/15, p. 107.

  22. #232
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Peggy Noonan:

    Republicans Need to Save Capitalism

    Let’s think about the broader, less immediate meaning of our political era.

    This is how I read it and have read it for some time:

    The Democratic Party is going hard left. There will be stops and starts but it’s the general trajectory and will be for the foreseeable future. Pew Research sees the party lurching to the left since 2009; Gallup says the percentage of Democrats calling themselves liberal has jumped 23 points since 2000. But you don’t need polls. More than 70 Democrats in the House, and a dozen in the Senate, have signed on to the Green New Deal, an extreme-to-the-point-of-absurdist plan that is yet serious: Its authors have staked out what they want in terms of environmental and economic policy, will try to win half or a quarter of it, and on victory will declare themselves to have been moderate all along. The next day they will continue to push for everything. The party’s presidential hopefuls propose to do away with private medical insurance and abolish ICE.

    Three years ago Hillary Clinton would have called this extreme; today it is her party’s emerging consensus.


    The academy and our mass entertainment culture are entities of the left and will continue to push in that direction. Millennials, the biggest voting-age bloc in America, are to the left of the generations before them. Moderates are aging out. The progressives are young and will give their lives to politics: It’s all they’ve ever known. It is a mistake to dismiss their leaders as goofballs who’ll soon fall off the stage. They may or may not, but those who support and surround them are serious ideologues who mean to own the future.


    None of this feels like a passing phase. It feels like the outline of a great political struggle that will be fought over the next 10 years or more.


    Two thoughts, in the broadest possible strokes, on how we got here:


    The American establishment had to come to look very, very bad. Two long unwon wars destroyed the GOP’s reputation for sobriety in foreign affairs, and the 2008 crash cratered its reputation for economic probity. Both disasters gave those inclined to turn from the status quo inspiration and arguments. Culturally, 2008 was especially resonant: The government bailed out its buddies and threw no one in jail, and the capitalists failed to defend the system that made them rich. They dummied up, hunkered down and waited for it to pass.


    Americans have long sort of accepted a kind of deal regarding leadership by various elites and establishments. The agreement was that if the elites more or less play by the rules, protect the integrity of the system, and care about the people, they can have their mansions. But when you begin to perceive that the great and mighty are not necessarily on your side, when they show no particular sense of responsibility to their fellow citizens, all bets are off. The compact is broken: They no longer get to have their mansions. They no longer get to be “the rich.”

    For most of the 20th century the poor in America didn’t hate the rich for their mansions; they wanted a mansion and thought they could get one if things turned their way. When you think the system’s rigged, your attitude changes.


    On the right the same wars, the same crash, and a different aspect. In the great issue of the 2016 campaign it became unmistakably clear that the GOP elite did not care in the least how the working class experienced immigration. The party already worried too much about border security—that’s the lesson the elites took from Mitt Romney’s loss in 2012, according to their famous autopsy. They appeared to look after their own needs, their own reputations: We’re not racist like people who worry about the border! They were, as I’ve written, the protected, who looked down on those with rougher lives. The unprotected noticed, and began to sunder their relationship with establishments and elites.

    Donald Trump came of that sundering. He was the perfect insult thrown in the establishment’s face. You’re such losers we’re hiring a reality-TV star to take your place. He’ll be better than you.
    Conservatives regularly attend symposia to discuss the future of conservatism. Republicans in Washington stumble around trying to figure what to stand for beyond capitalizing on whatever zany thing some socialist said today.

    But isn’t their historical purpose clear? Their job—now and in the coming decade—is, in a supple, clever and concerted way, to save the free-market system from those who would dismantle it. It is to preserve and defend the capitalism that made America a great thing in the world and that, for all its flaws and inequities, created and spread stupendous wealth. The natural job of conservatives is to conserve, in this case that great system.


    I’ll go whole hog here. We need a cleaned-up capitalism, not a weary, sighing, acceptance-of-man’s-fallen-nature capitalism. Republicans and conservatives need a more capacious sense of what is needed in America now, including what their own voters need. The party needs a tax-and-spending reality that takes into account an understandable and prevalent mood of great need. They need to be moderate, peaceable and tactful on social issues, but firm, too. This is where the left really is insane: As the earnest, dimwitted governor of Virginia thoughtfully pointed out, they do allow the full-term baby to be born, then make it comfortable as they debate whether it should be allowed to take its first breath or quietly expire on the table. A party that can’t stand up against that doesn’t deserve to exist.


    All this must be done with a sense of how Americans on the ground are seeing things. What they see all around them cultural catastrophe—drugs, the decline of faith, the splintering of all norms by which they’d lived, schools that don’t teach and that leave their kids with a generalized anxiety. They want more help to deal with this. If you said, “We’re going to have a national program to help our boys become good men,” they would be for it, they would cheer. If you said, “We’re going to get serious and apply brains and money to what we all know is a mental-health crisis in America,” they wouldn’t care about the cost—and they’d be right not to care. They think as a people we’ve changed, our character has changed, and this dims our future. Make things better on the ground now and we’ll figure out the rest later.

    These are not quaint nostalgists pining for the past, they are realists looking at ruin. They know some future crisis will test whether we can hold together as a nation. Whatever holds us together now must be undergirded, expanded.


    Much will depend on how the Republican Party handles this epic era, because the Democrats are not only going left, they will do it badly. They will lurch, they will be spurred by anger and abstractions, they will be destructive. They really would kill the goose that laid the golden egg, because they feel no loyalty to it.


    Republicans, save that goose. Change yourselves and save capitalism.


    You are thinking, “My goodness, that’s what FDR said he was doing!”


    Yes.

    Last edited by LA Ute; 02-15-2019 at 03:47 PM.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  23. #233
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    Peggy Noonan:


    I believe the GOP abandoned capitalism along time ago. The GOP already experienced this in the past election cycle with the selection of Trump over other candidates. The moderate GOP candidates didn't stand a chance. Neither did the far-right. The party abandoned all of that in favor of someone whose only ideology is what is best for him. The GOP with the tax plan that further rewards corporations and the uber wealthy and their failure to do anything meaningful about healthcare (issues that effect the masses) will help push the Dems. forward. The Dems, however, are their own worst enemies.

  24. #234
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  25. #235
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by UTEopia View Post
    I believe the GOP abandoned capitalism along time ago. The GOP already experienced this in the past election cycle with the selection of Trump over other candidates. The moderate GOP candidates didn't stand a chance. Neither did the far-right. The party abandoned all of that in favor of someone whose only ideology is what is best for him. The GOP with the tax plan that further rewards corporations and the uber wealthy and their failure to do anything meaningful about healthcare (issues that effect the masses) will help push the Dems. forward. The Dems, however, are their own worst enemies.
    I disagree with the characterization of either the GOP or the Dems as monolithic bodies. They're both complex political organizations.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  26. #236
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    I disagree with the characterization of either the GOP or the Dems as monolithic bodies. They're both complex political organizations.
    Sure, but in the end, they do vote as monolithic bodies. We've seen that even the most unqualified candidate will be supported by their party. All the complexity averages out into two monoliths in the end.

  27. #237
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by sancho View Post
    Sure, but in the end, they do vote as monolithic bodies. We've seen that even the most unqualified candidate will be supported by their party. All the complexity averages out into two monoliths in the end.
    So what did you expect “the GOP,” as you see, to do about Trump in 2016? It sounds like you’re assigning collective responsibility?

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

  28. #238
    Quote Originally Posted by LA Ute View Post
    So what did you expect “the GOP,” as you see, to do about Trump in 2016? It sounds like you’re assigning collective responsibility?
    I wasn't thinking about collective responsibility. I think we're all a bit guilty in different ways; certainly the two parties are guilty for where we are now. I was just saying that all the vibrant, complex diversity within a party doesn't add up to much in the end when every senator votes the party line 95% of the time.

    As for what I wanted the GOP to do in 2016, I wanted people to not support Trump. It came down to party vs principle. Some chose principle, but most chose party. People on both sides always feel like each election is too important to sacrifice in a principled stand.

  29. #239
    Quote Originally Posted by sancho View Post
    I wasn't thinking about collective responsibility. I think we're all a bit guilty in different ways; certainly the two parties are guilty for where we are now. I was just saying that all the vibrant, complex diversity within a party doesn't add up to much in the end when every senator votes the party line 95% of the time.

    As for what I wanted the GOP to do in 2016, I wanted people to not support Trump. It came down to party vs principle. Some chose principle, but most chose party. People on both sides always feel like each election is too important to sacrifice in a principled stand.
    For those outside the Trump core, wasn't the common call the need to entrench a conservative Supreme Court? LA, you've said the Court has become too important, so what prevented a vote based upon principle, other than Hillary's unlikability? What was she a threat to do?

  30. #240
    Sam the Sheepdog LA Ute's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Irving Washington View Post
    For those outside the Trump core, wasn't the common call the need to entrench a conservative Supreme Court? LA, you've said the Court has become too important, so what prevented a vote based upon principle, other than Hillary's unlikability? What was she a threat to do?
    If you were a conservative during the 2016 election, you were very worried about a 5-4 liberal majority on the Supreme Court. I don’t think liberals have quite the same level of worry. Roe v. Wade is safe, I think, and so major changes in the American way of life are not likely to occur with a conservative 5-4 majority. A liberal Supreme Court is, on the other hand, willing to make changes in the American way of life by virtue of a vote by single justice. I realize others may disagree strongly with me on this. Agree or not, that is the way the world looks to someone from a principled conservative point of view.
    Last edited by LA Ute; 02-19-2019 at 09:35 AM.

    "It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye."
    --Antoine de Saint-Exupery

    "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold."
    --Yeats

    “True, we [lawyers] build no bridges. We raise no towers. We construct no engines. We paint no pictures - unless as amateurs for our own principal amusement. There is little of all that we do which the eye of man can see. But we smooth out difficulties; we relieve stress; we correct mistakes; we take up other men's burdens and by our efforts we make possible the peaceful life of men in a peaceful state.”

    --John W. Davis, founder of Davis Polk & Wardwell

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