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You see what you want to see and believe what you want to believe and any time a credible source offers facts which don't fit into them you dismiss the source in your usual pantomime way.
Oddly enough, or perhaps coincidentally enough, this is pretty much how I feel about you lot. Once again, I will ask: what credible source did I dismiss out of hand? What facts did I dismiss in "usual pantomime way"?
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I do not believe that the right is evil and the left is saintly. There are just as many angels and devils, albeit of different character, on the left as there are on the right. I believe that those who approach politics with honesty, on both sides, do so with a desire to make the world better and improve lives.
I agree that extremes of either are not well-served in politics - although I am not sure that there are many, if any, who currently serve in U.S. politics who are interested in making the world better and want to improve lives. Our Congressional Approval Rating should bear that out.
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This doesn't, to my mind, describe you.
Interesting. Although I'd have to say that rigorous beliefs are held quite widely here, and by you. So apparently we feel the same way about the other, except from opposite sides.
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My impression of you is that you are one of those people who wants to sound tough and decisive without doing the hard work of actually thinking about anything.
When information runs contrary to your beliefs you, rather than thinking about it and discussing it in good faith, dismiss it out of hand.
When asked to explain how you arrived at a position you, instead, reiterate - without ever justifying - your position and resort to anecdote in lieu of evidence or thought.
And when it becomes clear - even to you, I'm sure - that your position has no intellectual foundation whatsoever, rather than doing what I really firmly believe a rational being ought - have a bit of a think about it - you resort to impotent infantile baits and limp insults. Like:
Sure. Yeah, I just became Republican because my daddy was a Democrat. Or something like that. No, I actually took the time to read about and study what Democrats traditionally believe against what Republicans believe and stand for. So, I believe in personal responsibility, am not afraid of hard work; we were taught to get the work done first and play later. One always does his best. That we accept a hand up, but not to settle for hand-outs, assuming we are capable of self-sufficiency.
Speaking about limp insults, I think you are one-way on that. It is OK to criticise the American, dismiss any statements out of hand and fail to indicate where the American has run afoul of facts or sources. Brits are quite accomplished at seemingly pleasant speech meant to injure, which has been done many times in the past.
I suspect the "rigour and honesty" bit is subject to your interpretation at all. Do you think you have a lock on that? Seriously?
Just so you know, I have a lifetime of rational thought on my positions. I have "had a think about it" more often then you might imagine. When it comes down to it, I think you are just annoyed that I don't come around to your way of thinking. Well, I likely won't. We are two different minds, yours tends to be left of centre, mine tends to be right of centre. We will possibly find common ground somewhere in the middle, but on what I am not sure.
I think you are basing most of your assertions on my not providing to you links for facts on obamacare. I explained why I did not, but of course in your haughty way you find fault. I did not want to appear to be cherry-picking results, and the data is a tough slog, being as there are so many angles. Obamacare is failing:
Earlier.
The way obamacare was set up, it seemed there was no way for insurance companies could lose, because there were built-in bailouts - that taxpayers would have to pay for - in case the exchanges failed. Well, we already experienced that in the financial and automotive sectors. Insurance is a business, and government has no place in business because it creates nothing, produces nothing except taxes. Our government is incredibly inefficient at doing anything at all - haven't you read the news? We waste, tax and pork-barrel ourselves to death, and you would wonder why I am Conservative in mindset?
Waste
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That 'fuck off' is from me alone, not 'us'
I knew that would be in there, somewhere. Thanks, your sentiment is a shared one.