Obama

[dairygirl4u2c]

i do have that experience. i was giving examples.
also, besides the naivette issue, it's not charity's place to be tending to people who have nothing, when it's society's fault they have nothing. society is fundamentally flawed at that point, and it's the government's job to fix the problem, not private charity.
sometimes it is role of private charity... when a person is merely down on their luck, when they have made mistakes, etc, while the system or more sound fundamentally... but not when the system systematically marginalizes so many millions of people, by the very design and will of that society.

"i suspect some doctors wold pony up, but the times they won't would be fragmented, and it wouldnt be nearly enough" it's already fragmented, and not enough, for so many people. i doubt cutting the programs even more is going to make doctors all that more charitable than they already aren't.

edit: and perhaps at the heart of the matter i dont see how governments presense is preventing people from ponying up and doing charity work. it starts to become a routine business, not something the person can occassionally do as people like to do per charity. the reason it'd be routine, is because there's millions who need it, and there's millions who need it, cause society is fundamentally flawed, and by the very design systematically marginalizing them.

Edited September 30, 2010 by dairygirl4u2c

[Winchester]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' timestamp='1285874548' post='2176995']
it's not charity's place to be tending to people who have nothing, when it's society's fault they have nothing.[/quote]
You have your own special definition of charity. I think that's wonderful.


[quote] society is fundamentally flawed at that point, and it's the government's job to fix the problem, not private charity.sometimes it is role of private charity... when a person is merely down on their luck, when they have made mistakes, etc, while the system or more sound fundamentally... but not when the system systematically marginalizes so many millions of people, by the very design and will of that society.

[/quote]
Not being a totalitarian, I disagree. The government will provide children with a free education, will provide citizens with free housing, food, etcetera. People choose to squander that which is given to them and their children. The biggest problem with "the system" is how it tries to solve individul problems with broad, idiotic legislation.


[quote]i doubt cutting the programs even more is going to make doctors all that more charitable than they already aren't.
[/quote]
Like I said, you obviously don't know very many doctors.

[Guest WTCincy]

Please everyone read up on the Church's teaching on subsidiarity and solidarity. The Catholic Church's Social Teachings do not equate with Socialism and the Church doesn't support Big Government policies.

In regards to Obama, if you were not aware of Obama's staunch support of Abortion on demand (even after the child survives abortion), and you only knew about his stance on the death penalty and other issues pertaining to CST, then your conscience would be clear in voting for him. However, if you knowingly voted for him despite his record on abortion, then you did so outside the teachings of the Catholic Church. CST clearly puts the right to life has the supreme issue and all other issues relating to dignity of the human person flow from that. Without life, no one is around to take care of the environment or stay out of wars, etc. All the other areas of CST are contingent upon our right to life.

Long story, short: there is no way a practicing Catholic can vote for Obama without going to confession afterwards given his continued support of abortion and expanding the access to abortion.

[Maggyie]

Doctors are wonderfully generous, I have benefited from free care in the past. But the current system is not working. It is. Not. working. The main issue is preventative care - women who do not have health insurance are not getting mammograms or pap exams, men are not getting prostate screenings, people with pre-diabetes don't even know it. By the time they go see the doctor it's too late and their condition is even more expensive to treat (or is untreatable, and we get to pay the social cost of burying someone prematurely). People die every day from the consequences of not having health insurance. I believe it's 7 every day in my state. It IS naive to think that if we just leave it up to doctors and hospitals they will all band together and treat the uninsured for free. What's stopping them from doing that now, exactly? That is EXACTLY the system we have now and as I said It is. Not. Working. They have to do some of it to maintain non-profit status, but there's no way they can handle it all and still turn a profit (even the so-called non-profit places need to make more money than they put out to stay afloat).

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote]Quote

i doubt cutting the programs even more is going to make doctors all that more charitable than they already aren't.


Like I said, you obviously don't know very many doctors. [/quote]

it's not like you know em, save the ones who you do know that does charitable work, such that you can then use anecdotal evidence to justify your preconceived notions, and draw overly broad conclusions about.

i know enough doctors who dont do private charity. and the ones who do, you have to fit their specific criteria. there's not many who approach tehse things systematically as would be required without the government, and is even required and not done as needed now.

and who i do know more about is even more important and indicative- the people who the doctors aren't treating.

Edited September 30, 2010 by dairygirl4u2c

[Winchester]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' timestamp='1285880270' post='2177020']
it's not like you know em, save the ones who you do know that does charitable work, such that you can then use anecdotal evidence to justify your preconceived notions, and draw overly broad conclusions about.
[/quote]
So, what's up Pot?

[dairygirl4u2c]

the only way to reconcile what all the popes have said, is to create the distinctions i have regarding private charity. it's not really me making up definitions or whatever, but me creating a basic distinction that even by catholic standards, catholics should understand.
im just giving meat and doing the paradigm shifting that is necessary for anyone wanting to implement catholic standards.

plus what's with the 'rights v. entitlements' dinstinction? not that anyone's said im playin word games, but this is the biggest loop de loop.

the popes have said access to the earth is a right. they say we should tax the rich to bring about world peace. they say the government should be involved in this. see all those quotes i often quote for the evidence.
anything that would tie to basic human necessity, at least at a basic level, would tie into this.
are we do think that they're saying tax the rich so that we can keep everyone else's taxes lower, while only doing that which the government normally should do according to modern day conservative ideas? ie, roads, police etc etc? that's never been proposed as a solution at reconciling the liberal sounding and conservative sounding popes.... i had to go out of my way to form that idea, 'so that we can keep everyone elses taxes lower'. how to reconcile the quotes is still an unfinished task by all the conservatives here who take the 'erie silence' approach to em. the context and gist of the liberal sounding popes, is that we and gov should be doing these thigns to protect people's rights, cause these are a matter of justice.
if that's the case, then there's probably times when government is warranted, and times when it's not. we see from the popes when they are warranted, and the only possible conclusion are distinctoins like my charity ones. these are the only ways of reconciling what all the popes have said.

Edited September 30, 2010 by dairygirl4u2c

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote]
Banana Republic Here We Come

By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: September 23, 2010
The New York Times

Once upon a time, a Latin American political party promised to help motorists save money on gasoline. How? By building highways that ran only downhill.

I’ve always liked that story, but the truth is that the party received hardly any votes. And that means that the joke is really on us. For these days one of America’s two great political parties routinely makes equally nonsensical promises. Never mind the war on terror, the party’s main concern seems to be the war on arithmetic. And this party has a better than even chance of retaking at least one house of Congress this November.

Banana republic, here we come.

On Thursday, House Republicans released their “Pledge to America,” supposedly outlining their policy agenda. In essence, what they say is, “Deficits are a terrible thing. Let’s make them much bigger.” The document repeatedly condemns federal debt — 16 times, by my count. But the main substantive policy proposal is to make the Bush tax cuts permanent, which independent estimates say would add about $3.7 trillion to the debt over the next decade — about $700 billion more than the Obama administration’s tax proposals.

True, the document talks about the need to cut spending. But as far as I can see, there’s only one specific cut proposed — canceling the rest of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which Republicans claim (implausibly) would save $16 billion. That’s less than half of 1 percent of the budget cost of those tax cuts. As for the rest, everything must be cut, in ways not specified — “except for common-sense exceptions for seniors, veterans, and our troops.” In other words, Social Security, Medicare and the defense budget are off-limits.

So what’s left? Howard Gleckman of the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center has done the math. As he points out, the only way to balance the budget by 2020, while simultaneously (a) making the Bush tax cuts permanent and (b) protecting all the programs Republicans say they won’t cut, is to completely abolish the rest of the federal government: “No more national parks, no more Small Business Administration loans, no more export subsidies, no more N.I.H. No more Medicaid (one-third of its budget pays for long-term care for our parents and others with disabilities). No more child health or child nutrition programs. No more highway construction. No more homeland security. Oh, and no more Congress.”

The “pledge,” then, is nonsense. But isn’t that true of all political platforms? The answer is, not to anything like the same extent. Many independent analysts believe that the Obama administration’s long-run budget projections are somewhat too optimistic — but, if so, it’s a matter of technical details. Neither President Obama nor any other leading Democrat, as far as I can recall, has ever claimed that up is down, that you can sharply reduce revenue, protect all the programs voters like, and still balance the budget.

And the G.O.P. itself used to make more sense than it does now. Ronald Reagan’s claim that cutting taxes would actually increase revenue was wishful thinking, but at least he had some kind of theory behind his proposals. When former President George W. Bush campaigned for big tax cuts in 2000, he claimed that these cuts were affordable given (unrealistic) projections of future budget surpluses. Now, however, Republicans aren’t even pretending that their numbers add up.

So how did we get to the point where one of our two major political parties isn’t even trying to make sense?

The answer isn’t a secret. The late Irving Kristol, one of the intellectual godfathers of modern conservatism, once wrote frankly about why he threw his support behind tax cuts that would worsen the budget deficit: his task, as he saw it, was to create a Republican majority, “so political effectiveness was the priority, not the accounting deficiencies of government.” In short, say whatever it takes to gain power. That’s a philosophy that now, more than ever, holds sway in the movement Kristol helped shape.

And what happens once the movement achieves the power it seeks? The answer, presumably, is that it turns to its real, not-so-secret agenda, which mainly involves privatizing and dismantling Medicare and Social Security.

Realistically, though, Republicans aren’t going to have the power to enact their true agenda any time soon — if ever. Remember, the Bush administration’s attack on Social Security was a fiasco, despite its large majority in Congress — and it actually increased Medicare spending.

So the clear and present danger isn’t that the G.O.P. will be able to achieve its long-run goals. It is, rather, that Republicans will gain just enough power to make the country ungovernable, unable to address its fiscal problems or anything else in a serious way. As I said, banana republic, here we come.[/quote]

[Winchester]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' timestamp='1285885781' post='2177062']
plus what's with the 'rights v. entitlements' dinstinction? not that anyone's said im playin word games, but this is the biggest loop de loop.
[/quote]
How so?

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote]In Leviathan, Hobbes set out his doctrine of the foundation of states and legitimate governments – based on social contract theories. Leviathan was written during the English Civil War; much of the book is occupied with demonstrating the necessity of a strong central authority to avoid the evil of discord and civil war.

Beginning from a mechanistic understanding of human beings and the passions, Hobbes postulates what life would be like without government, a condition which he calls the state of nature. In that state, each person would have a right, or license, to everything in the world. This, Hobbes argues, would lead to a "war of all against all" (bellum omnium contra omnes), and thus lives that are "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short" (xiii).

To escape this state of war, men in the state of nature accede to a social contract and establish a civil society. According to Hobbes, society is a population beneath a sovereign authority, to whom all individuals in that society cede their natural rights for the sake of protection. Any abuses of power by this authority are to be accepted as the price of peace. However, he also states that in severe cases of abuse, rebellion is expected. In particular, the doctrine of separation of powers is rejected:[9] the sovereign must control civil, military, judicial and ecclesiastical powers.[/quote]

[Winchester]

I don't give two craps about cartoon tiger philosophy.


Answer the question.

[dairygirl4u2c]

if you were referring to 'entitlements' only in the sense that bums and lazy folks who abuse neglect etc themselves should not have entitlements... then i could see creating the distinction between 'rights' and 'entitlements'.
my concern is trying to create a distinction that circumvents the government's responsiblity to good faith citizens who can't get ahead and get oppressed by 'the system', and i argue that here notably by showing that even by catholic standards, we have to worry about this stuff.

edit: this is why i started arguing pope stuff after i drew attention to what i called the loop de loop of entitlement v. rights. i was elaborating.

Edited September 30, 2010 by dairygirl4u2c

[dominicansoul]

[quote name='Mikaele' timestamp='1285629354' post='2176309']
I'm not even living or from the States. But I was wondering, is Catholicism compatible with some of the bad policies Obama supports?Can you be a Catholic in good standing and still support this man?
[/quote]
[img]http://media.caglecartoons.com/media/cartoons/1/2010/09/30/83886_600.jpg[/img]

[Winchester]

[quote name='dairygirl4u2c' timestamp='1285889445' post='2177090']
if you were referring to 'entitlements' only in the sense that bums and lazy folks who abuse neglect etc themselves should not have entitlements... then i could see creating the distinction between 'rights' and 'entitlements'.
my concern is trying to create a distinction that circumvents the government's responsiblity to good faith citizens who can't get ahead and get oppressed by 'the system', and i argue that here notably by showing that even by catholic standards, we have to worry about this stuff.
[/quote]
Okay.

You have a right to own a home. This does not mean the government must provide you a home. It means the government must not deny you a home or permit someone by grave injustice of denying you a home (like burning it up or eating your title before you sign it). There are minor injustices which the government should stay out of ("I will not sell property to <insert population here>")

Health care is a right. It is not an entitlement. If it truly is an entitlement, then the government can order doctors to perform procedures, determine doctors' working hours, specialties, retirement age etcetera. This is the logical conclusion of viewing people as entitled to health care. It is a service. Doctor's don't have a genetic predisposition to croutons golden eggs. They work for a paycheck, and they see a lot of patients. At some point, someone will not get a freebie or a significant reduced rate. This is life.

I don't see other groups making significant sacrifices (insofar as seriously reducing their standard of living) to ensure these supposed entitlements. The Kennedys bleed purple piss for the uninsured, but they didn't start a cheap insurance company or start living in 2000 square foot houses at a middle class level to make a difference themselves. It's all about legislating behavior so that those making the laws aren't seriously affected. But doctors are supposed to suddenly work on people who can't pay. You think it's only the doctor? There's a staff--there are many, many people who must get paid, even in small doctor's offices there's plenty of overhead. I know a lot of doctors. They work. As a general rule, they work very hard. They makre pretty good money, a good number of them.

[dairygirl4u2c]

[quote] those already sick then would be getting no special treatment if they get the same cap everyone else does, especially if they are making up for it with premium and deductiable hikes. Those who are poorer, maybe they get some assistance, subsidies, but ensure the carrots and sticks exist for them not to abuse it either-- and we probably should create systems solely made to address tehse people, to make it an efficient process. Most of their care should not be expensive, it's just the 'supply demand' and system we've designed to make it expenssive- the bottomline of doctor patient should exist for them, and easilyu could and would were it not for the system we've designed and let happen. it's not fair to let people fall through the cracks just cause of all our red tape and 'can't agree on the details so nothing happens' [/quote]

i do wonder if insurance companies, when forced to take on preexisting conditions, would find a way to do it cheap. cause at the most fundamental level, it's not hard to cover by far most patients, it's simply a matter of care- people who are smart and knowledgeable along with medicatinos that aren't expensive except in at most their 'demand' and what htey are able to charge (eg two cent pills that are jacked up to hundreds of dollars). sure, we have jacked up doctor and medicine costs, but there's ways to do it cheap, at the most fundamental level.