I'm going to state the obvious here...

[Javaman]

if and when any sort of cut comes to SS or Medicare, I predict a massive blood letting here at DU.

It won't be pretty and it won't be for the faint of heart.

So don't be the least surprised if it turns into a full on gladiatorial blood bath if/when SS and Medicare get cut or altered.

I see many a tombstone, many an ignore and many just leaving. Of course there will be the grand proclamations of leaving but not actually leaving.

I love DU when massive upheavals happen. It's better than must-see-tv!

[dionysus]

1. lol, no kidding.

[asjr]

2. In other words nothing much will change.

[jefferson_dem]

3. Yuppers...

Best batten down the hatches, and don your hardhat, bio-chen suits, and golashes folks.

[meegbear]

4. Like the post-2004 election smearfest

[tekisui]

5. Don't forget the blind defense of every Obama action.

I always enjoy the stretches, spins and great lengths needed to mount defenses.

[emulatorloo]

9. Don't forget the half-truths and knee-jerk fabrications and dishonest hyperbole

from the anti-Democrat contingent.

I already see this amongst DU'ers who are trying to claim that cuts in waste/fraud by the Healtcare Industry is "secretly" cuts to beneficiaries.

I expect a lot of selective quotation from articles, assertions of things that aren't true, blanket inflammatory statements, jargonistic sloganeering about Obama's "Secret Plan to Destroy America",

[Shagbark Hickory]

6. I think everybody should just calm down and brace for impact.

In other words be prepared and try not to take it out on one another here.

[emulatorloo]

7. See this post, pretty much outlines the scenario you are predicting

Actually this scenario is going on right now, but it will escalate no matter what is in the deal.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=433x702502

=====================================

SS/medicare cuts...can we please clarify? posted by Sheepshank

To throw out hyperbolic statements and generalization about cutting social security and medicare is disingenuous in my opinion.

I am fully against cutting any of the benefits that go directly to recipients. I am NOT against cutting fraud, cutting red tape and cutting administrative costs.

So polls and crap about cutting social security in general, are simply biased in the negative when ignoring these two very different aspects of cuts. It just frustrates the bejebus out of me, and is misleading. In fact so misleading as to be purposeful in riling up the public in manner that is angry, fearful, negative, conceding, etc.

=======================================

[seabeyond]

13. so this is the "cuts" obama is talking about. well, i guess i a going to have to read some shit

instead of just subject lines. sigh. i dont jump in immediately. i have to warm to a subject

[DocMac]

19. It's the fraud.

It seems like Washington can create a three letter entity for anything but fraud. Call it the Fraud Recovery Agency (FRA). These are the people that should be in jail for real. Can you imagine what could be saved from healthcare alone?

[still_one]

8. I don't think so. If they cut SS and Medicare, 99% of DU will feel the same way /nt

[emulatorloo]

11. If the cuts were to benefits, you are correct. If the cuts are to waste and fraud, some will try

claim that the cuts are "really" to benefits.

This is what the Karl Rove types claimed in their dishonest 2010 ads that said "Democrats voted to cut MEDICARE!" when the truth was HCR cut healthcare costs and wasteful spending.

Some DU'ers have apparently adopted this model.

[Fumesucker]

25. No, there's a significant percentage that will defend *anything* Obama does..

I'm not sure how big the percentage is but they are loud and extremely persistent.

[seabeyond]

10. i dont know, i had about 70 anthony threads in hide threads, lol. was a lot of work at the beginnin

but well worth it as time went on.

[Davis_X_Machina]

12. DU has never been good at facing the facts:

Everyone's read Kevin Drum this morning, right?

This isn’t what I want, and it’s not what the progressive wing of the party wants. But the plain fact is that deficit cutting is pretty popular across the board, modest reductions in Social Security and Medicare will probably go over fine with independents, and anyway, liberals have nowhere else to go. A few might actually do what my friend threatens to do, but in the end it won’t be many — especially after the Republican Party settles on a candidate and we’ve all had a year or so to get to hate him (or her). And Obama will raise a fantastic amount of money from wealthy donors who are OK with this kind of dealmaking regardless of whether the progressive blogosphere is happy with him. Like it or not, the sad fact is that Obama doesn’t need us.

Politics is about power. Liberals don't have enough, because there aren't enough liberals.

[Speck Tater]

14. +1000. That is so very true. The powers that be, regardless of party, don't care what we want ...

... because we are irrelevant. We don't matter. We are too few and too powerless to matter to anyone. Sure, it makes us feel all good and righteous to come here and pat each other on the back and tell ourselves how we are going to "punish" whichever politicians don't do out bidding, but the fact is they don't care what we think.

In truth, every one of us is wasting our time coming here to DU and getting up on our digital soap boxes to preach to the choir. It's a pointless exercise in self-gratification. We will NEVER change the minds of people who disagree with us, so debate is pointless. We will NEVER change the mind of the powers that be, so outrage is pointless. We will NEVER influence the outcome of a single election, anywhere, so vociferous online campaigning is pointless.

Better we should all go get a hobby like bird watching, or stamp collecting, or jigsaw puzzles. At least that way we could each be doing something pointless without having to raise our blood pressure in the process.

(NOTE: I know many will disagree with me and try to bludgeon me with "facts" and opinions to "force" me to realize how wrong I am. But in truth, you will NEVER get me to change my mind, so before you even post your angry rebuttal, know that the very acting of posting an angry rebuttal is, itself, a clear demonstration of the futility of posting ANYTHING here in this forum, because your doing so will change nobody's mind, but will supply supporting evidence of my claim.)

[Davis_X_Machina]

15. If we were more numerous, then they'd care. Change your neighbor's mind...

...and then the 'we' gets a little bigger. If the 'we' gets large enough, then things will change.

Not before, though. (It's why I teach....)

[Erose999]

20. There will be plenty of liberals when people are reduced to eating catfood in their retirement...

Now with more Horse meat...

[loyalsister]

21. True. dreaming that there is a silent majority

that is fully aligned with our politics is delusional. The concept of "correct" is claimed by opposing sides and everyone in between. How does a person who is supposed to represent us all do it?
The most democratic way is to work with the congressional representative branch.
I really disliked Bushes unilateral moves and disregard for congress. Is it really okay to abandon that principle just because unilateral decisions would match my politics?

[Davis_X_Machina]

22. Obama, and I suspect it's the con-law professor in him...

...has deferred to Congress on all these major upheavals -- on stimulus; on the ACA; on not having a budget, but a set of continuing resolutions going into the elections; on the lame-duck tax passage; and here -- not getting involved until the last minute impasse.

What aggrandizing of the executive he has done has been in areas -- defense/foreign policy/law enforcement -- where there's a history of Congress deferring to the executive.

[loyalsister]

23. Exactly

He is a true believer in American Democracy and an ideology of bringing people together. That means honoring the people in districts that elect his partisan enemies.
It's idealistic and may prove to be completely ineffective. Or it may work and I just won't get what I want. Regardless, I see value in returning the executive branch to a less authoritarian role.

[Davis_X_Machina]

24. It's a long game....

...and the hankering after kings isn't restricted to the right.

[loyalsister]

27. We fell a long way during the Bush years

There is no realistic reason to expect moving back to a real representative democracy to be easy or fast.
According to most historians I have come across, rejecting a role of king is one of the most admirable characteristics of George Washington and therefore the entire formation of our democracy. It seems controversy over that impulse has been and is ongoing.

[defendandprotect]

29. This is a liberal nation -- and DU is majority liberal -- which is a huge threat when

Obama tries to turn the Dem Party upside down into an anti-FDR and

anti-New Deal party -- as I'm sure you've noticed from the posts attacking

Obama on these issues!

Liberals are a huge voting bloc -- and they need to begin to discuss what to do

with that power --


Voting for the lesser evil only moves the party and Congress further to the right !!

[blogslut]

16. It's a lounge kind of day

[seabeyond]

17. any more rain coming our way, or that was it. wasnt it soooo exciting.

hubby and i sat on the porch, amongst all the awesome lightning. grassed greened a tad too. lol. but having been days ago, well, need some more.

doin your raindance still?

[blogslut]

18. Just enough to keep the dust from kicking up

It was sweet, what we had. :hi:

[Dappleganger]

26. It's only cloudy here, hoping it comes.

The retention pond out back is so dry there's a fucking beach all the way around. Turtles are lovin' it!

[Marr]

28. The bloodletting will be on one side only, I expect.

You'll have endless threads of White House talking points and think tank "wisdom", followed by lots of "deleted" responses and tombstones.