I don't understand why Americans are so frightened by things that other countries have done so well on?
-socialised medicine
-higher taxes (VAT: value added tax)
-proper education
-secularity
-big government
1. Show me where socialized medicine has been successful. All I see are countries with long waiting lists, inadequate services, and crippling tax burdens. The reason socialized medicine is a bad idea and feared in America is because it creates unlimited demand which strains supply to the max. It's like if a gas station offered free gasoline, there would be a line around the block of people waiting for their free gas whether they need it or not. The same principle applies with health care, if health care is "free" every asshole with so much as a sniffle will go to his or her doctor to get treated because it's "free". Because government can't keep up with demand they have to either: deny people coverage, have people wait for medical care, or both.
2. I agree with you here, income taxes are outdated and inefficient. I like the FairTax myself, it's a consumption tax very similar to the VAT. The American people are not afraid of consumption taxes, their government is. The income tax gives politicians a lot of power, consumption taxes take it away, simple.
3. If by "proper" education you mean government controlled education then America already has that. Government or "public" schools are the norm here and they're terrible. If your kid is stuck in a shitty school you have three options in this country: move, enroll in a private school (which only the wealthy can afford), or home school (can't really do this if your poor either). You can't just move your child to a different public school (well you can but it's almost impossible). The sad thing is that private and home schoolers blow public school kids out of the water performance-wise but for some reason many Americans think that if you just increase funding of public schools then they will perform better when really this is totally opposite. If you put more money into your shitty machine without changing how it operates then all you get is a bigger shitty machine.
4. America is a secular nation, all religions practice freely and there is no established religion. Religious people vote and influence their government, but that doesn't mean the country isn't secular. Are you suggesting religious people shouldn't vote?
5. This one is my favorite, the reason big government is bad in a nutshell is because it is corrupt and inefficient. Government can do some things well such as collect money, and write checks. As far as running things government is inferior to the private sector, big time. The problem with the way government is run is that its incentives are backwards, employees are rewarded by tenure rather than performance, government agencies are rewarded for spending their entire budgets with more funding, agencies that save money are punished with cuts. If a business does poorly in the private market, then it goes out of business and another better company takes over. If a government agency does poorly, then it receives more funding because it "wasn't funded properly". It's also almost impossible to fire a government employee, not so in the private market. So basically government employees and agencies are not motivated to be efficient or effective, I mean why should they? All they have to do is sit on their fat asses year after year and their pay goes up regardless of their performance. Another this is if I don't want to deal with a business, I DON'T HAVE TO. If I don't like Wal-Mart I can tell them to go fuck themselves and go to Target. I HAVE TO deal with the government whether I like it or not,
...in 1950 America was the worlds supreme superpower, since then America has been overtaken by dozens of countries all founded on the above listed principles. In fact the argument could be made that America is teetering on the brink of total economic collapse.
America's GDP is still 3 times higher than the country in second place so I wouldn't say it's on the brink of collapse or in any risk of being overtaken any time soon. America is having some problems, but most of them are due to out of control spending, high taxation, and government regulation, not because of a lack of socialism.
Why do conservative Christians espouse the kind of nonsense The Coach is spouting in this thread?
What kind of nonsense is he spouting? Where is he wrong about anything he's saying about the Messiah?
Since when is Rush Limbaugh, fabricator of 95.6% of all the statistics he quotes, considered a reliable source? What's with the stupidity of people happily shouting "Obama is bad for America... Big Oil/Big Tobacco/Big Pharma/Big Money told me so!"
Just because you don't like what Rush has to say doesn't mean that he doesn't bring up good points. I trust Rush more than the regular socialist media because at least Rush admits he's biased as hell. You know where he's coming from, the rest of the media pretend that they are "objective" which is total horseshit, just look at the constant orgasms they're having over this Obama guy, it's embarrassing. Why would the regular media be a more reliable source of information when you know right of the bat that they are lying their asses off about their motives and biases?
...I just don't understand right wing American Evangelicals? Why do they vote Republican? Jesus would vote Democrat, surely?
They vote Republican because of abortion. The stupid useless issue of abortion, these people would vote Stalin himself in if he had the "right" view on abortion. The anti-choice religious nuts in the republican party are a liability, they are the reason that that old liberal geezer McCain got the nomination. The Republican party must crash and burn and be rebuilt into a real nationalist capitalistic party again.
