jem286 do good?
This is an email argument between my aunt and me. Let me know if I did okay and if I'm missing any obvious arguments. She is an EXTREME right-winger and this argument started when I told her to please not email my family anything negative or offensive about Obama. That, apparently, opened the door for her to argue and scream socialism.
How do you guys deal with family arguments, or any argument with a friend via email? I enjoyed this brief back-and-forth, but it stresses me and I want to just cut it off. How should I end it when she inevitably replies with her usual Limbaugh lines?
Her
First thing, that was sent to your mother by mistake,I meant to send it to a friend whose email is very close to your moms. I don't care who you voted for, but I do care very much what he is doing to this country.
He won because many Republicans didn't like McCain so they just stayed home. They were upset with Republicans because they had been spending like liberals and were not representing Conservative ideas. If you watch the polls Obama is dropping steadily because Americans and beginning to realize what Obama really is doing and that their freedoms are being taken away. If his health care goes through, (House Bill version) the government will be able to go into your bank account and take funds for medical procedures. You and everyone in America will lose their private health care (except for every member of the Congress). If you listen to Obama's speeches from 2007 (not altered, but straight from his mouth) he wants complete Single Payer health care. He says that he might take several years, but that is his aim. Also, Barney Frank, just last week, said that that is what they are working toward. That interview has been on TV. I have read a lot of the bill and there are many things in it that are not being reported on by the main media. This bill will also pay for medical care for all illegal aliens. The CBO (Congressional Budget Office) which is a non-partisan office that all president's have relied on have said that if this bill passes it will be unsustainable and will send this country into debt like we have never seen. You can probably find a lot of facts about this bill on the Internet if you want. How many people go to Canada or Britain for their health care? Health care does need reform but not by destroying the best in the world and making it into Socialized Medicine.
If you want to have discussions about this I would love to. But you do not always get all of the facts from CNN, I watch CNN off and on, just to see what they are saying, and never once have they reported on the parts of this bill that will and should scare every American. This is not about Democrat, Republican, Independent, or Libertarian, this is about every single American's health care and the future of this country.
Me
I will take this point by point, and do so respectfully as you have been to me.
First, Obama won because more people voted for him. You say it's because Republicans stayed home, however, McCain received only 3 million fewer votes than George Bush did in 2004, but still lost by 10 million votes. Also, Republican turnout only decreased by 1.3% in 2008, while McCain lost by 7.2%. Republican turnout is not why Obama won. He won because people preferred his ideas for governing. Obama has not changed his stance on any major issue since becomg President, so there have been no surprises. He wanted to end the war in Iraq, increase in Afghanistan (which I don't necessarily agree with, but I knew that voting for him), pass a stimulus package that economists on both the right and left said needed to occur, reform healthcare, and improve relations overseas.
Yes, his approval numbers have dipped, but that happens to every single president once they get in office. The honeymoon wears off. According to Gallup and Research 2000, Obama still has approval from a majority of Americans (56% and 62% respectively) despite all of the disinformation and constant attacks from the Republicans in Congress.
About Bush spending like a liberal, I'm afraid history doesn't corroborate your point. Liberals have actually decreased the deficit over time, and Republicans have increased it. Reagan tripled the national deficit, while Clinton gave us the first budget surplus in decades. Obama was handed the biggest deficit in history when he came into office and made no excuses about the fact that, for the time being, the deficit would increase to help the economy. For one, he actually put both wars in the budget, which Mr. Bush did not, so Obama is being more honest. During a recession the government cannot stop spending, but they must increase it. It's simple economics. When demand goes down, supply suffers, and the only entity with the ability to stimulate demand is the government. Herbert Hoover decreasing spending during the depression in the 1930s is what turned that recession into a great depression. It took spending from FDR to curb the decline of the economy and stimulate consumer spending.
About healthcare, there is no one final bill yet to read; there are at least 3 that are floating around. They still need to go into conference where they will be changed, amended, and rewritten, and then voted on again by both the House and Senate. So nothing is set in stone by any means and there is no one definitive bill to cite yet.
The government isn't taking over healthcare. Period. The aim is to create an option. If you like your insurer, you will keep it. Period. I don't understand how many times Obama has to reiterate this point. Not everyone is fortunate enough to be able to afford the skyrocketing cost of insurance, and those that have insurance and then actually have to use it find out that their insurance barely covers anything. Also, some cannot get insurance or are dropped because they have a preexisting condition, and this is not fair. A public option (OPTION) is what people need (a poll showed 76% of people approved of a public option). The only effect it would have on you and others who have insurance is that your private insurer may lower their rates to compete, and I thought competition in the marketplace was the cornerstone of conservative ideals. It's what makes the free market free.
Also, we already pay for illegal immigrant healthcare when they go to the emergency room, which costs IMMENSELY more than providing cheaper preventative care. Not to mention, the public option doesn't just give healthcare away to people, they still have to pay for it. It won't be a free service, it will have a cost to the purchaser, just like any other insurance provider.
I assume you are on Medicare, which is one of the most popular and favorably rated insurance programs in the country. In case you did not know, Medicare is run by the government. As is the VA for our military, which is the 2nd most favorably rated healthcare organization - another "government run" insurance organization. If it's good enough for our elderly and veterans, why is a public OPTION not good enough for the American people.
By the way, I get my news from CNN, PBS, CSPAN, BBC America, and from sites such as Politico, The Huffington Post, Washington Post online, Wall Street Journal online, New York Times online, and even the Drudge Report. However, I always go to the source and look for either Congressional bills or quotes from politicians because there will always be a hint of bias in ALL media and it's important not to just ingest what some talking head or radio talk show host says. I do watch Olbermann and Maddow in the evenings on MSNBC, but I take what they say with a grain of salt and look up things to make sure they are accurate.