All Repigs and too many "Democrats" have forgotten these wise words of Theodore Roosevelt

[hifiguy]

“The great corporations which we have grown to speak of rather loosely as trusts are the creatures of the State, and the State not only has the right to control them, but it is duty bound to control them wherever the need of such control is shown.”

(emphasis added)

And TR meant CONTROL, not make "suggestions" to them and then yip for a doggie treat.

[upaloopa]

1. What Dems forgot that?

I know Bernie supporters who represent all the people remember Roosevelt saying that and Hillary supporters who only represent corporations forgot it.
All you are doing is co-opting other people for your personal motives. We know as much about reality as you do maybe more.

[hifiguy]

2. If you have to ask, the substance of the quote

has whizzed several miles over your head.

[upaloopa]

3. How long have you been a Dem?

I was born when Truman was President. I've been a Dem since I could first vote in 1968. You can't speak for the people

[hifiguy]

5. My first hero who wasn't a baseball player was Robert F. Kennedy.

I was 11 at the time. 47 years later RFK is still one of my very few personal heroes.

When I was 16 I set aside money out of my allowance for several weeks so I could give $5 to George McGovern's presidential campaign.

Never missed a presidential election since 1976, when I cast my first vote for POTUS for Jimmy Carter.

Good enough? Not that I care if it is in your eyes.

I've always been a person who puts principle over label.

[upaloopa]

7. My point is that lots of us have been Dems for

a long time and have been through many campaigns and many life experiences. For you to label people you disagree with as corporatists is ego centric and narcissistic.
You have principles and we who support Hillary don't is what you are saying.
You can't go around defining people it doesn't inspire people and is one reason Bernie isn't doing so well.

[hifiguy]

10. The presentation of facts is neither narcissistic nor egocentric.

Facts do not have such qualities.

HRH is a corporatist who is owned by the banksters and the Military-Industrial-Intelligence Complex. That is a fact, not an opinion.

She chooses to associate herself with some of the vilest and most criminal people on the face of the earth, and publicly praise them: Lloyd Blankfein, Jamie Dimon, and worst of all wanted War Criminal Henry Kissinger, an evil butcher with the blood of millions of Vietnamese, Bangladeshis, Argentinians, Cambodians, Nigerians and Chileans on his hands. She described him, in print, in the Washington Post, as a "defender of human rights." That is a fact, not an opinion.

Rationalize that away. We are known by the company we choose to keep.

[marym625]

25. You forgot Larry Summers, author of the End Game Memo.

Just disgusting, despicable, horrible stuff

[hifiguy]

28. Robert Rubin too, a thief of epic proportions.

Who was on Obama's transition team (isn't that special!!)

But the complete list of HRH's slimy connections to the criminal and quasi-criminal oligarchy would fill a good-sized book.

[marym625]

31. someone laughed at the fact Bernie Sanders has legislation passed

That has helped Veterans because McCain said it. Actually asked if Sanders also hangs with Gawdy.

I just replied that Hillary hangs with the Georges, both HW and W. Never received a response.

What I find so bizarre and perplexing, is all this is ignored. Not just by supporters, but by MSM and so very many politicians that are supposed to be on the side of the people. I truly do not understand.

[hifiguy]

33. The Little Chimp himself has said that

he thinks of the Clintons as "honorary members" of the Bush Crime Family, and HRH "is like a sister-in-law" to him. Poppy is also in on the "honorary members" part. If that doesn't tell someone everything they need to know about the Clintons, I cannot begin to imagine what would. Jebus, the stench from those words would knock a buzzard off a shitwagon.

You never saw Jimmy Carter hanging around with criminal shitweasels afterhe left the WH, but then Jimmy Carter is an honorable, decent and moral man.

[marym625]

38. well said!

[rhett o rick]

41. There are two sides to this class war, the People's side and the Corporation's side.

One side supports Sen Sanders and the other supports HRC. HRC is very closely tied to major corporations. She claims to be a friend of the 99% but it appears her first allegiance is to those that pay big money to her, to her campaign and to her foundation. Why take the chance? Support a candidate that clearly sides with the 99%.

[Hortensis]

8. I confess I also thought you were just another of the cons hanging here

using this to take a dig at liberal Democrats, but it appears to just be an expression of discontent. Whatever. There's a lot to be discontented about.

You can't expect all "repigs," as you call them, though, to disapprove of corporate power. Some cons have strong fascist leanings, including over-respect for the competence and authority of business and people with lots of money, even if they'd be shocked at the very idea that that that loathsome word could apply to them. They wouldn't even take a hint of a lesson from Mussellini's arresting all the liberal leaders and dissolving Italy's legislature and replacing it with a council of corporate leaders. Fascism, they "know," is a liberal thing -- it's dogma and they're well indoctrinated -- and they're prepared to fight with all they have to save America from liberal attempts to instill fascism via such sinister things as the Affordable Care and Dream Acts. (They'll swallow anything.)

Funny-ha-ha, huh?

[hifiguy]

9. I'm sure the folks who are getting 50% increases

on top of their already piratical insurance premiums are just thrilled with the way the ACA has worked out.

But it WAS mostly written by Big Insurance and Big Pharma for their own benefit; anything that accrued to the people was clearly secondary and unintended.

"The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. "

Again, Theodore Roosevelt

[Hortensis]

11. Oh, go blame the conservatives then. The vast majority of us

wanted single payer. Including Obama.

You know, the perspective understanding creates is good. What's the difference in willful foolishness between a con habitually observing the world through an indulgent little editing pipe and anyone else? One might even come to understand that Big Business really is BIG BUSINESS. POWERFUL BUSINESS. As long as half the electorate chooses to just sit on its thumbs, it will be rolled!

Blame yourself, if you must blame someone on the left, for not doing more. Some let us down, but many of our people in Washington put tremendously more effort into healthcare reform than most of us ever bothered to consider doing, much less do. I myself participated in exactly one demonstration with my daughter-in-law, and then we went to lunch. The end.

[hifiguy]

13. When negotiating, you always start by asking for more than you know

you are going to get. I saw countless negotiations in civil lawsuits while clerking for two trial court judges and that is Rule Number One. You never get anything close to what you want if you give away the whole loaf, save for the heel, as your opening salvo

At the very beginning of the discussions, single-payer advocates were invited by the POTUS to get the hell out of the room as quickly as possible while Big Insurance and Big Pharma were given pride of place at the table, and the public option vanished soon thereafter.

He never even tried. Can anyone imagine a master negotiator like LBJ or Tip O'Neill giving away 90% of the game before the opening bell?

[Hortensis]

15. Right. They were all incompetent. If only they'd just grabbed just about

any civil court negotiator, shoved him or her in the room, and gone to lunch, so much could have been different.

With the benefit of hindsight, Hifiguy, I really wish Obama had gone for everything too. I wish he'd given up trying to achieve bipartisan agreements in just about everything much sooner than he did. But early on he really thought his election might signal the end to the long dark night of divisiveness that was so damaging to all of America, not just our healthcare. He did try. It's just that his goal was even larger.

[hifiguy]

18. ITtwas anything but incompetence.

The deal that was desired from the beginning was the one that was achieved in the end - with the corporations who profit most from running the system as the only winners and, if anything, reinforced in their stranglehold on the lives of tens of millions of Americans. They can be squeezed to financial death more efficiently and thoroughly now.

No other possibility was even seriously mentioned, much less considered. It was an absolute masterpiece of kabuki theater that gave the appearance of change without any of its substance.

Mission accomplished. For the oligarchs.

[Hortensis]

21. Okay. Actually, the profit margins in medical care are very small.

Most big money just bypasses that in favor of medical devices and pharmaceuticals. There they've taken a stand and are investing vast sums to protect their profits, instead of settling for a cap of 20% of comparative peanuts. But we did achieve an end to denial of coverage for preexisting conditions, an end to lifetime limits for specific illnesses, and an end to not being accepted for insurance at all. These are HUGE -- real life destroyers that are gone. We achieved electronic medical records and new, first-ever standards that providers are required to meet in dozens of realms that end much abuse, waste, and negligence. And much else.

It's not nothing just because private companies are still paid to administer our policies for up to that 20% cap. Note that they do not "insure." Insurance as we once knew it is obsolete, and that will be the downfall of that 20%. Why should we pay more than the 7% Medicare Advantage policies cost over the cost of patient care? Single payer is still coming someday.

[hifiguy]

22. It's enormous on insurance

and monopolized pharmaceuticals. And it was the insurance and pharma companies that wrote the most important parts the ACA.

[Volaris]

24. There's another one that I like, but from an...unlikely source, to say the least..

'There are WONDERS in the universe to satiate appetites both subtle and gross. But they are NOT FOR THE TIMID.'

Q, to Picard after the first encounter with the Borg, and the question of whether or not the Human Race would continue to explore the galaxy.

=)

[Scootaloo]

32. I notice you're completely evading the topic of discussion, Upaloopa.

Instead all you're doing is griping about someone not supporting your candidate.

Why is that?

[upaloopa]

34. No I just don't need to defend against

bull shit claims. I don't play that game.
If you have a real sourced point to make I would talk about it.
You just make shit up about Hillary then you expect us to give it some credence.
Not going to happen.

[Scootaloo]

36. Who said anything about you? or Hillary?

[Populist_Prole]

44. I've come to wonder, these past weeks/months

Last edited Sat Oct 31, 2015, 02:43 PM - Edit history (1)

When those who rankle over corporatist/Third-Way candidates being called as such, just what rankles them? It's never clear and reasons of substance are rarely given.

Is it:

They deny that said candidate is connected with corporatists? Or that there isn't even a Third-Way organization?

They may acknowledge it but are unconcerned, such is the personal fervor for which they support said candidate? ( fanboys or fangirls )

They actually agree and support a corporatist agenda?

They are aware of the corporatist agenda but feel kowtowing to it through cooperation will bear fruit regarding the candidates using the bully pulpit for other issues?

[rhett o rick]

39. Those that continue to support corp-backed candidates. Afraid to take a chance to

help the 50 million living in poverty. Goldman-Sachs doesn't give a crap about them so why would a real Democrat support them?

[moondust]

4. "The era of big government is over."

Guess who.

[littlewolf]

40. wasn't that Hillary's husband …? nt

[moondust]

42. Yes it was. n/t

[Angry Dragon]

6. kick

[meow2u3]

12. K&R for exposure of who's controlling whom

Modern polticians, especially repunks and turd way "Democrats" think corporations should control the people, not the other way around.

[tk2kewl]

14. can't we just tell them to "cut it out?"

[WillyT]

16. HUGE K & R !!! - THANK YOU !!!

[jwirr]

17. Bernie told us that the corporations are to be controlled by

the government and instead they control the government.

[hifiguy]

19. Yep. There's a lot of TR in him.

And the Bull Moose platform on which TR ran 103 years ago is quite noticeably to the left of HRH on mny of the issues that are still germane (needless to say some are not).

See http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/primary-resources/tr-progressive/

[jwirr]

20. Yes, that to.

[Cassiopeia]

23. Don't worry, they're going to cut it out!

[marym625]

26. you beat me to it! n/t

[elleng]

27. They HAVE, Cass!

[marym625]

29. K&R!

Beautifully done up thread, too!

You need to post more often. Love this post and your responses!

[Dont call me Shirley]

30. Corporations/Business are allowed to exist by the government for the benefit of society. They

belong under the heavy thumb of government regulation, not as those who write their own regulations. Now business has forced their way into regulating the government, that is called Fascism. DLC/3rd way is the Fascist arm of the D party. That's why they are trying to silence progressives.

[hifiguy]

35. TR repeated the essence of your wonderful first sentence

for years, no more so than when running as the Progressive ("Bull Moose&quot candidate for the presidency in 1912. And now we have so-called Democrats running away from what he stood for 103 years ago and embracing the exact opposite. Some people are easily bought and STAY bought. I won't mention who.

Bernie should call himself a Bull Mooser. He's plain-spoken, despises TR's "malefactors of great wealth" and comes from a state with plenty of actual moose.

[Dont call me Shirley]

43. The pendulum always stops in a state of perfect balance. Bernie would restore that balance just

like Teddy and Franklin did.

[KoKo]

37. ...!