Althouse: Democrats don't feel your pain either.

May 11, 2017

Democrats don't feel your pain either.

It's all a con.

That's my reaction to "Republicans Don’t Feel Your Pain," by Thomas B. Edsall in the NYT.

93 comments:

rhhardin said...: I don't feel my pain either. It's all for women.

That's why you don't want women voting.; 5/11/17, 10:24 AM
readering said...: Clickbait.; 5/11/17, 10:24 AM
rhhardin said...: Women make themselves out of needs, men make themselves out of obligations.; 5/11/17, 10:24 AM
Gahrie said...: So if you stop taking money from group A and giving it to group B you are taking money from group B and giving it to group A?

Lefty logic at work.......; 5/11/17, 10:25 AM
Pookie Number 2 said...: It is all a con, which is why - beyond the demonstrable proof of free markets creating more wealth than any other mechanism in history - these bipartisan frauds should be given as little power as possible.; 5/11/17, 10:32 AM
harrogate said...: And yet, is this not true:

"During the campaign, Trump appeared to fully grasp Manchin’s point.

Trump declared that 'there will be no cuts to Social Security, Medicare & Medicaid' and added that 'the middle class has to be protected.'"

Oh, but "it's all a con" leads us where? To a shrug and a "meh"?; 5/11/17, 10:33 AM
Matt Sablan said...: Wanting politicians to feel our pain seems like a bad idea. They already have a lot of bad things getting in the way of good decisions. A lot of bad policy will be made solely to stop the immediate pain.; 5/11/17, 10:37 AM
Pookie Number 2 said...: Oh, but "it's all a con" leads us where? To a shrug and a "meh"?

Hopefully to more liberty, as both parties' supporters recognize that they're being played to their own disadvantage.

Probably won't happen.; 5/11/17, 10:39 AM
Ann Althouse said...: I just don't believe any of the claims that one politician feels more genuine empathy than another. They just choose to enact empathy or they don't. I'd like to see some good policy on health care. Everything I see from our elected officials is awful. So much money is spent and yet people are asked to pay insane amounts for insurance. I can barely understand my own insurance, and I'm relative smart and have Medicare.; 5/11/17, 10:42 AM
Michael K said...: The "cuts" are always suspicious to me as most are cuts in rate of increases.

They are going to block grant Medicaid to states who can then decide.

The couple holding hands in the photo are, of course, both men.; 5/11/17, 10:43 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "enact empathy"

That's ambiguous. Sorry.

I don't mean enact like enact legislation.

I mean enact like an actor manages to look like somebody who feels what he wants you to believe he feels.; 5/11/17, 10:44 AM
Ann Althouse said...: Who had more empathy Trump or Hillary?

Answer: Bernie.; 5/11/17, 10:44 AM
harrogate said...: "Who had more empathy Trump or Hillary?

Answer: Bernie."

Agreed. But this isn't really about Hillary, in my mind, or even about Donald. It's that we have this national conversation about how people are struggling and in the Rust Belt especially (counting Manchin's constituents there), their struggles informed their votes. To implement Ryan's policies in the wake of that conversation, and then to say it's about "freedom"?

Pretty harsh. Murica.; 5/11/17, 10:50 AM
Known Unknown said...: "and I'm relative smart"

Uh-huh. ; ); 5/11/17, 10:56 AM
rehajm said...: I'd like to see some good policy on health care. Everything I see from our elected officials is awful. So much money is spent and yet people are asked to pay insane amounts for insurance

Problem is half of America believes 'good policy on health care' means those last 2-3 million people who can't figure out how to get insured any other way need to be insured even it means destroying the system that's working well for 245 million others. Asking everyone else to pay' insane amounts' is 'good policy' from that point of view.; 5/11/17, 10:57 AM
rhhardin said...: What you want is not empathy but govenment to stop fucking you over.

The guys' point of view.; 5/11/17, 10:58 AM
Fernandinande said...: Ann Althouse said...
I can barely understand my own insurance, and I'm relative smart and have Medicare.

"A seminal study of health literacy in two urban hospital outpatient populations (N=2659) found, for example, that 26% of patients did not understand information about when a next appointment was scheduled and 42% did not understand the directions for taking medicine on an empty stomach."; 5/11/17, 11:01 AM
Kevin said...: Anyone who runs around with a pink pussy hat isn't going to be out-empathied by anyone.; 5/11/17, 11:01 AM
Fernandinande said...: rhhardin said...
What you want is not empathy but govenment to stop fucking you over.
The guys' point of view.

Indeed. "Empathy" ~ "we're here to help you".; 5/11/17, 11:03 AM
Bay Area Guy said...: It's worse than a con, because Dems cause the "pain" you are feeling (high burden of taxes and regulations, lawfare, unlimited illegal immigration, political correctness, weird gender rules for bathrooms, etc, etc); 5/11/17, 11:21 AM
John said...: " I'd like to see some good policy on health care. Everything I see from our elected officials is awful. So much money is spent and yet people are asked to pay insane amounts for insurance. "

The problem is: "Healthcare" has become synonymous with "Insurance". Expecting good 'policy' on healthcare and then saying insurance costs too much is continuing the problem. If you think Medicare is difficult to understand you're missing the point: confusion is "built-in" for a reason - and not due to any empathetic impulse.; 5/11/17, 11:21 AM
Limited blogger said...: Thank you President Trump for enabling us to have these discussions.; 5/11/17, 11:30 AM
Bob Boyd said...: I'm from the government and I'm here to empathize.; 5/11/17, 11:35 AM
TestTube said...: Seems like just another stage in the breakup between the Democrats and the Middle Class

Stage 1: Why are you seeing that new Trump Guy? You're racist. Sexist. Homophobic. Stupid. Deplorable. Shame on you!

Stage 2: Oh, that Trump! Those Republicans! They'll never love you like WE loved you! They aren't empathetic. WE'RE the empathetic ones! We OWN empathy.

Stage 3: ??; 5/11/17, 11:36 AM
TestTube said...: Maybe Stage 0 was Denial: Oh, They'll never vote for Trump! They love us! They love Hillary!; 5/11/17, 11:38 AM
Ron Winkleheimer said...: You mean the Democrats are still trying to sell themselves as the party of the working man?

LMAO

When you're putting people out of business for refusing to bake a cake and importing the working class' cheaper replacements while calling them deplorable and openly celebrating that you expect them to die off and thus be removed as an obstacle to "progress" that's a hard sell to make.; 5/11/17, 11:41 AM
n.n said...: Let's consider that they both feel your pain, but are following different paths to the same resolution. The journey matters.

I suggest revitalization, rehabilitation, and reconciliation.

Also, capitalism (i.e. organic economics) works to set pricing in a world with finitely available and accessible resources. Sometimes, affordable costs less than "free."; 5/11/17, 11:43 AM
furious_a said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 5/11/17, 11:52 AM
Ignorance is Bliss said...: harrogate said...

It's that we have this national conversation about how people are struggling and in the Rust Belt especially (counting Manchin's constituents there), their struggles informed their votes. To implement Ryan's policies in the wake of that conversation, and then to say it's about "freedom"?

Yes, people are struggling, largely due to high unemployment/underemployment. The Democrats offer to subsidize those people who are struggling, with more and more government programs. The Republicans are suggesting getting the government out of the way so that people can be self-sufficient.

The former appears to appeal to the young people with XYZ studies degrees. The latter appeals to the working class.; 5/11/17, 11:53 AM
furious_a said...: You didn't build that.

Going to put coal-miners out of business.

If you like your plan you can keep your plan...

Democrats don't so much feel others' pain as they enjoy inflicting pain on others.; 5/11/17, 11:54 AM
Static Ping said...: Government does not feel your pain. Particular individuals in government feel your pain, but as an aggregate, no. Particular individuals in government also cause your pain, particular individuals in government cause your pain and enjoy it, and particular individuals can cause you pain and then feel your pain not realizing that they are the proximate cause thereof.

If you want to someone to feel your pain then start a family, go to church, or buy a dog. A cat can fake it sufficiently for some cases.; 5/11/17, 11:57 AM
furious_a said...: Or maybe...Democrats "feel your pain" the way a Dominatrix feels the lashes on her clients' backs.; 5/11/17, 11:57 AM
furious_a said...: Who had more empathy Trump or Hillary?

Answer: Bernie.

Yes, Bernie really understands my third house and my wife's imminent loan-fraud indictment.; 5/11/17, 12:00 PM
furious_a said...: Wanting politicians to feel our pain seems like a bad idea.

That's how you get a histrionic Jimmy Kimmel making health care policy.; 5/11/17, 12:01 PM
I'm Full of Soup said...: This story gets into the ins and outs of Medicaid and the states etc and that is boringly complex. So I did not read the story and only glanced thru it.

We truly need someone to make this crap simple and gut the statutes and all the laws and regulations that make it so complex. And I ain't suggesting single payer.; 5/11/17, 12:26 PM
Real American said...: LOL Bernie. Being economically illiterate isn't empathy.; 5/11/17, 12:30 PM
Left Bank of the Charles said...: Uh oh, someone's feeling the Bern!; 5/11/17, 12:33 PM
exiledonmainstreet, green-eyed devil said...: furious_a said...
Wanting politicians to feel our pain seems like a bad idea."

If you fall over on the street with a heart attack and only one person is around, would you rather that person be a layperson who has had a heart attack himself and would empathize with your suffering or an arrogant but highly competent cardiologist with an awful bedside manner?

I realize that's a flawed analogy because pols are neither genuinely empathetic nor highly trained experts. But it seems to me we have put more stock in feeeeeeelings and good intentions than in trying to objectively look at outcomes and facts. So you've got economically illiterate people (as Real American said) promising the moon and others falling for it.; 5/11/17, 12:35 PM
Nonapod said...: furious_a said...Yes, Bernie really understands my third house and my wife's imminent loan-fraud indictment.

Well, to be fair, Bernie still probably believes he's the most empathetic. Even after he's clearly profited from his stardom he fails to see any hypocrisy in that. That's mostly due to him being a gormless dumbass. He still believes transforming America into a workers paradise like Venezuela is the truly empathetic thing to do. He's that rare bird, the complete and utter fool who has found himself with an enormous amount of influence due to a series of unlikely events and a desperate and gullible youth population.; 5/11/17, 12:53 PM
furious_a said...: ...would you rather that person be...

I'd rather that person understand that they need my vote and cooperation with their laws more than I need their ass in that seat in the Legislature. With that understanding we can then both work around the skillset issues.; 5/11/17, 12:55 PM
Michael K said...: We truly need someone to make this crap simple and gut the statutes and all the laws and regulations that make it so complex.

Block grants would do a lot. The process would be local and therefore more open.

Washington always deducts its share and the rest is always smaller than it would be.

I remember reading a report on welfare back in the 90s. The social workers always did well even if the "beneficiaries" rotted away.; 5/11/17, 12:57 PM
furious_a said...: I'm still procesing that Bernie was such a lazy bum into his 30s that he was asked to leave a commune because of his general uselessness.; 5/11/17, 12:59 PM
exhelodrvr1 said...: Policy based on handling the exceptions is almost always poor policy. That's why you don't want policy-makers to be very empathetic.; 5/11/17, 1:10 PM
ccscientist said...: Let us postulate that they did feel our pain. This does not mean they know how to fix it. Many things the gov does makes things worse or causes other problems while fixing one problem. Empathy alone does not make good policy or law. By feeling the pain of parents of children who were raped, sexual offender laws were written that sweep up teenagers sending each other pictures (even the boy who receives a pic from a girl) or the 17 yr old with a 16 yr old girlfriend. Empathy not sufficient.; 5/11/17, 1:13 PM
tcrosse said...: If anybody else felt my pain, then I would be obligated to feel theirs. No thanks. Let everybody feel their own goddam pain. To do otherwise is to, as my Father would say, borrow trouble.; 5/11/17, 1:57 PM
Sprezzatura said...: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/tim-kaine-cries-health-care_us_59137b4be4b0b1fafd0ddcd3?section=us_politics; 5/11/17, 2:01 PM
Unknown said...: NYT? this is hack flack.

Medicaid is going to be cut 800 billion OVER 10 YEARS. Where current spending is 550 Billion, so a 15% cut (assuming 550 B a year baseline).

Regressive taxes, sounds bad. Means if you pay more in tax you will get more back. Doesn't sound so bad.

"They don’t know how they got it, they don’t know who gave it to them, they don’t know the Democrats, nothing about, “It’s Obamacare." They don’t know any of that. All they know is they’ve got it." And they're about to learn a new vocabulary word, 'co-pay.'; 5/11/17, 2:12 PM
Dave from Minnesota said...: I wonder if Tim Kaine feels the pain of the people and policemen that his son, LINWOOD, attacked in St Paul.; 5/11/17, 2:16 PM
Bilwick said...: I wish "liberals" (and by that I mean of course "tax-happy, coercion-addicted, power-tripping State fellators") feel the pain Big Brother inflicts on his victims.; 5/11/17, 2:19 PM
Pookie Number 2 said...: Who had more empathy Trump or Hillary?

Answer: Bernie.

How many poor kids went to bed hungry because Bernie decided that he needed a third house instead of giving the down payment to a food bank?

He has a better schtick, but he doesn't actually give a damn.; 5/11/17, 2:20 PM
Paco Wové said...: I think it was Anatole France who said "Power is divided between fools and knaves".

The Democrats are generally knavish fools, while the Republicans are foolish knaves.; 5/11/17, 2:29 PM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: Democrats like your pain, and want more of it. Punitive laws, punitive restrictions, Carbon taxes, high deductibles, high premiums, job killing regulations, crony givaways, wasted tax dollars - mocking Colberts - pain.

Haiti.; 5/11/17, 2:32 PM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: Kim Jung Un would kill Bernie last.; 5/11/17, 2:33 PM
vanderleun said...: I want my enemies to feel their pain.; 5/11/17, 2:39 PM
Larry J said...: Politicians are the cause of much of our pain. They inflict damage, then use the damage as justification for letting them do even more. Politics is a self-licking ice cream cone.; 5/11/17, 2:46 PM
Earnest Prole said...: The empathy stuff is bullshit. The political and budgetary reality is deadly serious. Republicans have signed onto universal health care; we're now just arguing over whether they can claim credit for some of the freebies.; 5/11/17, 3:11 PM
Seeing Red said...: Impose Insty's revolving door surtax and repeal the Hollywood tax cuts and they might feel a splinter.; 5/11/17, 3:23 PM
buwaya said...: "Republicans have signed onto universal health care"

The US already has near-universal healthcare, between Medicare, Medicaid, employment mandates, and emergency room coverage.

Its really very Japan-like, based as that is on both personal and employer medical insurance mandates, plus free care for charity cases. Just much more messy and far more expensive.; 5/11/17, 3:26 PM
n.n said...: If they do it right, they will consider the general Welfare (for the People and our Posterity), restore capitalism to reduce catastrophic anthropogenic economic change, and focus on a path of revitalization, rehabilitation, and reconciliation.

Did they remove the penalty for preexisting conditions, specifically birth (i.e. unPlanned Parenthood)?; 5/11/17, 3:31 PM
I Callahan said...: I can barely understand my own insurance, and I'm relative smart and have Medicare.

I've been in the health insurance business for 27 years, and I can tell you that this is common, and understandable. It is difficult to understand. Oddly enough - Medicare is just as hard to understand.; 5/11/17, 3:36 PM
n.n said...: The US already has near-universal healthcare

That's with excessive immigration (a.k.a. immigration reform), without revitalization, and without reconciliation.

much more messy and far more expensive

It's a comprehensive issue but seems to be centered on the provision of medical care and related. Severe, even catastrophic, progressive economic misalignments should not be possible in capitalist economies. They are by their nature self-regulating and resistant to runaway conditions.; 5/11/17, 3:39 PM
rhhardin said...: On health care, it will wind up a VA system for everybody and private care for people who want to pay.

The key is getting rid of the insurance language.; 5/11/17, 3:42 PM
Jim at said...: I don't want Republicans OR Democrats to 'feel my pain.'

Just stay out of my life and leave me the hell alone.; 5/11/17, 3:45 PM
Big Mike said...: Democrats mostly cause my pain.

But what you miss, Althouse, is the question of empathy for whom? Hillary has no empathy for anyone except perhaps Chelsea. Barack Obama was more of the same, so perhaps that's the way to become a nominee for the Democrats is to have your sense of empathy surgically removed.

I thought that Trump had empathy for the ordinary working stiff, and I still believe that. People who work with their hands at tough, dirty jobs and in hotel service industries -- people he knows, and he respects their contributions. University professors, who turn up their noses at hard work? Regular politicians who tell voters whatever they want to hear? Not so much.

Answer: Bernie

You're trolling us, right Professor? An alleged socialist who owns three houses and who let his wife drive a small university into bankruptcy? I don't think he cares about anyone he doesn't see when he looks in the mirror.; 5/11/17, 4:00 PM
buwaya said...: FWIW, there are all kinds of pain. Unemployment is one.
The people who feel other peoples pain like to choose the sort of pain they feel like feeling.

They don't feel pain they don't care about.

Anyway, the other sort of pain -

https://data.bls.gov/pdq/SurveyOutputServlet?request_action=wh&graph_name=EC_ectbrief

Cost of employment growth (nearly all employer-mandated medical insurance) vs Wage growth by quarter, 2007-2017. See the bump 2010-2012. That is Obamacare, escalating employment costs, reducing employment growth/recovery, reducing wage growth. These are annualized growth, not a cost index, so whats gone on there at the time happened, and is done, and is affecting the present.

This analysis is not present in the MSM nor has it been honestly addressed here by anyone. This is not the expected gradual cost escalation of overall US healthcare costs, this is something extreme that clearly happened as a result of a change in public policy.; 5/11/17, 4:09 PM
The Godfather said...: I just did a word search of the Constitution. Would you believe that "empathy" is not a required qualification for any federal office?; 5/11/17, 4:41 PM
JackWayne said...: We are in a cold Civil War. Do the democrats understand how dangerous their #resistance is?; 5/11/17, 4:42 PM
Brand said...: There is a difference between getting insurance and being able to use it due to high deductables.

For example, Manchin's daughter is Mylin's CEO, Heather Bresch. Mylin markets the EpiPen. Mylan raised the price from around $100 for a package of two EpiPens in 2007 to around $600 in 2016. The normal user will essentially spend thousands to the Manchin family prior to meeting the deductable.; 5/11/17, 5:24 PM
Michael K said...: The people who like Obamacare, like the British who like the NHS, are mostly people who have never used it.

Obamacare is mostly Medicaid with higher income limits.

Some people here have said they think their coverage is better but I know of no one outside Medicaid who says that.

The exchanges are going away as insurance companies are leaving the market.

I have definite ideas on what real reform would look like but nobody wants a physician's opinion except for academics who don't take care of patients. They know exactly what to do.

It's just like the New England Journal, which is mostly written by academics getting hysterical about any cut to NIH funding.

The president’s proposal has far-reaching implications for public health, research and drug development, and keeping America at the forefront of innovation. It also threatens young scientists who are the future leaders of academia, biotechnology, and the pharmaceutical industry. “If cuts of such magnitude pass, we will lose a generation of scientists,” says Mary-Claire King, a professor of genome sciences and medicine at the University of Washington whose early funding from NIH led to the identification of the BRCA1 gene and its role in inherited breast cancer. “Scientists doing research in new areas are the most vulnerable and the first who will be let go. We will have a scientific drought, which is even harder to fix than a natural one.”

That was last week. This week they are hysterical about immigration limits.; 5/11/17, 5:38 PM
Sebastian said...: Sure, it's a bipartisan con. But 1. Dems cause me more pain 2. Dems use the pain meme more. 3 At least some Republicans understand that the pain meme itself causes us pain. 4. Traditional conservative policy (small government, simple rules, low transfers, let most people take responsibility for their own lives) makes official empathy, however fake, less relevant.; 5/11/17, 6:03 PM
Fred Drinkwater said...: I recently ended a year of helping my 90 year old mother-in-law cope with medical insurance issues for her 94 year old husband. This involved Medicare, two hospitals & ERs, a surgical group, two medical groups, hospice, assisted-living, rehab, physical therapy, in-home care, two state's tax laws, several powers of attorney, and no doubt a few other things.
Now, I am a technical manager by trade (retired), and my wife is a finance professional (semi-retired) and a demon at working the system (any system).
The two of us could barely keep up as his care needs changed, for better and for worse. A small example: he went in and out and in, for hospice care. Each transition meant a switch in his medical care staff, allowed procedures, and the agencies responsible for his care equipment. Each separate PIECE of equipment was managed by a separate sub-agency. (Wheelchair, aspirator, oxygen generator, etc.) Same thing for PT, OT, etc.
Two lessons:
1. An absolutely enormous number of people are employed in this process, and have to be paid.
2. I can't imagine how any elderly patient or their spouse could, by themselves, successfully navigate and control their care in this system.
I'd sure hate to put my own family through the strain of doing all that for me.; 5/11/17, 6:09 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: It's always good to see law professors set examples on important policy arguments by just throwing out blanket, blind assertions of the "nanny nanny nah nah" variety instead of actually coming up with a grown-up thought to post.; 5/11/17, 7:11 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: That was last week. This week they are hysterical about immigration limits.

That's because the Republicans are doing hysterically ridiculous things.; 5/11/17, 7:17 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: I have definite ideas on what real reform would look like but nobody wants a physician's opinion except for academics who don't take care of patients. They know exactly what to do.

It's just like the New England Journal, which is mostly written by academics getting hysterical about any cut to NIH funding.

The president’s proposal has far-reaching implications for public health, research and drug development, and keeping America at the forefront of innovation. It also threatens young scientists who are the future leaders of academia, biotechnology, and the pharmaceutical industry. “If cuts of such magnitude pass, we will lose a generation of scientists,” says Mary-Claire King, a professor of genome sciences and medicine at the University of Washington whose early funding from NIH led to the identification of the BRCA1 gene and its role in inherited breast cancer. “Scientists doing research in new areas are the most vulnerable and the first who will be let go. We will have a scientific drought, which is even harder to fix than a natural one.”

Behold: A non-researcher who hates non-practitioners opining on practice reform, opines that researchers don't have valid conclusions to draw about the impact of research funding policy.

You can't make this stuff up, folks. Especially the part about how the NEJM's problem is that it's written by "academics."

Who the f-ck else is going to write it? Lab technicians.

This opinion is about as nonsensical as one lamenting that it's the physicists who are writing physics articles instead of carpenters and mechanics.

Spoiler alert: Physicians are generally highly overpaid manual laborers. And surgeons are usually the worst of the bunch.; 5/11/17, 7:22 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: I just don't believe any of the claims that one politician feels more genuine empathy than another.

That's a good point. Democrats feel empathy for the lives of patients and Republicans feel empathy for the earnings statements of health insurance executives.

So much money is spent and yet people are asked to pay insane amounts for insurance. I can barely understand my own insurance, and I'm relative smart and have Medicare.

Back in the day - before Republicans outlawed knowledge, there used to be this field of study called "economics." One of its basic foundational principles stated that a strong way to make markets fail was to enable something called "asymmetric information," meaning that you wanted the market to perpetuate a way for one party to a transaction to confuse you with all sorts of knowledge that was not generally accessible to you.

In this case, it's a complex market that Republicans want to perpetuate in order to strengthen the insurance company's advantage over you.

They're enabling the disadvantage to the consumer/patient. But hey, the freedom.

These are the standard games that Republicans like to play. They do it in pretty much every industry, but in this one the complexity is so vast, that they can't help the joy they feel at how lost and bewildered a patient can become. And at direct risk to their lives, no less!

There's no way a Republican could pass something like that up. They get a thrill - and feel so alive!

It's the jungle brought into your hospital and doctor's office. A true survival contest! Think of the ratings!; 5/11/17, 7:31 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: To boil down the market failure in insurance, imagine a market for insuring contractors where those who didn't do the job right could make the difference between a house that fell apart in ten years vs. one that fell apart in a hundred.

Yeah. Now imagine their insurers getting their choice to cover every one (or none) of every act they performed: Sawing the wood, installing the screws, assembling the staircase. You get the picture, I'd guess. Even a Republican could understand the mayhem in that.

Hey, yeah we covered the nails, but not the glue! I know it's a hundred dollars, that's YOUR problem, Jack!; 5/11/17, 7:38 PM
Swede said...: Sometimes, when I'm at my Republicans Are Evil And We Know It meetings, our callous, uncaring laughter takes several minutes to die down before we can even get the meeting started.

And then somebody mentions the poor and it all starts back up again.; 5/11/17, 7:42 PM
Qwinn said...: Meanwhile, the Left is screaming "Shame!" At a NJ rep because he dared mention his daughter who died of cancer.

Because empathy.; 5/11/17, 7:48 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: Sometimes, when I'm at my Republicans Are Evil And We Know It meetings, our callous, uncaring laughter takes several minutes to die down before we can even get the meeting started.

And then somebody mentions the poor and it all starts back up again.

Obviously. Nothing shows you care more than ridicule. FTD and Hallmark specialize in sympathy bouquets and cards that mock their recipient.

Other than that, the above reads almost like a textbook case of sociopathy. We expect this from Republicans.

Look! An insurance exec's earnings report needs attending to! Quick, to the legislative bat cave!; 5/11/17, 7:57 PM
Swede said...: That's not very empathetic of you.

Your mocking ridicule has put me in a shame spiral that I don't think I'll be able to pull out of.

The good news is that I've been internet diagnosed as a textbook sociopath.

So, I guess that makes me the victim here, right?

Sweet!; 5/11/17, 8:08 PM
Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...: Oh how clever of you!

People dying, but you tie yourself in knots with a Lewis Carroll gibberish logic game designed to pawn off yourself to look like the forsaken one.

Republican partisan priorities. Ladies and Gentlemen: In case you wanted to understand how the country got to the state it's in.; 5/11/17, 8:14 PM
The Cracker Emcee Refulgent said...: In a prosperous society Democrats have to inflict pain, severe pain, in order to create and keep the underclass they rely on for electoral success. No underclass, no Democrat ever winning a state or federal office. Really, it's so freakin' obvious it's not even open to debate. Democrats reap wealth and power from the pain of others. They have no rational incentive to end that pain so, unsurprisingly, they perpetuate it with the weak milk of government assistance and fostering an endless sense of victimhood.; 5/11/17, 8:29 PM
Qwinn said...: Indeed. Democrats create the problems, blame the opposition, then present themselves as the solution. If they actually solved them, though, they'd lose power, so they'll never, ever allow that to happen.; 5/11/17, 8:56 PM
Dear corrupt left, go F yourselves said...: Everyone should read "Clinton Cash".; 5/11/17, 9:00 PM
n.n said...: Principals before principles.

Religious/moral philosophy to keep the honest people honest, and competing interests to prevent others from running amuck.; 5/11/17, 9:22 PM
Big Mike said...: People are dying

Every day people die. Number of people born = number of people who will eventually die. That includes you, Toothless, as well as me. Difference is that when I die there will be people who mourn my passing.

There are people who've died because of healthcare delivery in the US during the 21st century, but most of them were caught up in that single payer nightmare called Barack Obama's Veterans Health Administration. You can't put Dumbocrats in charge of anything to do with healthcare -- they only screw it up.; 5/11/17, 10:41 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: Remember when Krugman pushed the VA as the model of single-payer health care? That was before all the scandals broke. The things the VA is accused of doing were remarkably similar to the horror stories you hear about Britain's NHS.
Krugman doesn't talk about the VA being a model of single-payer health care these days. When you are on the Left, there is no intellectual accountability. You just pretend it never happened. Reality can be criticized, but not the model that produces the reality.; 5/11/17, 10:56 PM
Lewis Wetzel said...: Democrat priorities: make everyone go to the VA. They die waiting in line for routine procedure, but, hey, they still have "access to health care."
Isn't that a marvelous turn of phrase. "Access to healthcare" is not nearly the same thing as "healthcare." It kind of reminds me of the Soviet era joke about the redeemable tokens they would give people at the bakery when tried to get their ration after the bread ran out: the government couldn't give you the loaf of bread they promised you, so instead they gave you a picture of a loaf of bread.; 5/11/17, 11:01 PM
Alex said...: TM
16 hours ago
I grew up in a household that supported Democrats. I had two blue-collar working parents. I was taught that the Republicans were not and would never be for the working classes, that they worked to benefit the rich and add more to their bank accounts, and that they were quite heartless.

Fast forward 60 years. No significant change. Much worse, in fact.

The Republicans have plainly shown us over the decades who they are. Now we need to believe them and vote accordingly.

Get them out, every last one of them!

Ah yes preaching to the New York Times choir will sway those swing voters in purple states!; 5/12/17, 12:05 AM
Unknown said...: Attention to you all,I'm agent smith from USA,I'm one of the
twelve selected agent sent by the grand-master to expose Illuminati to
the world,we the twelve agent are identify with the head-quarter number
and the email I will drop here also,you are not allowed to contact us on
Facebook because will the real agent are not allowed to chat with you
on Facebook that is why you are ask to contact us in email or call,those
that you will contact on Facebook are not real and if you contact them
they will not be able to help because they are not one of us,please be
wear that you are not allowed to contact any agent on Facebook,if you
are willing to join email us or not on Facebook by
e-mail;worldmoneyilluminati669@gmail.com or cal us, on whatsapp now +2347052744530
for more information and to no if you contact a real member please call
our head-office on (+18187569256) be ware of scam....,,,,; 5/12/17, 5:11 AM
Tom Perkins said...: It was a con when you voted for Obama too.; 5/12/17, 8:33 AM
FryingPanHead said...: The democrats need a permanent underclass to stay in power.

Truer words were never spoken. Create them, import them or shame them into being.

Democrat -n- One who panders to the mindless whims of the masses; 5/12/17, 8:52 AM
Meremortal said...: To a politician, empathy means "path to power".

Period.; 5/12/17, 11:31 AM