Ted Cruz running for Prez

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

If the freedom of the internet is taken away who knows what is next; maybe That White Sox Fan in the White House while start regulating Twins fans

The thing is about net neutrality is that if you don't like what happened with the Title II reclassification, blame Verizon. We had well-reasoned, fair regulation of the internet until Verizon just had to go sue the FCC because they're greedy, horrible slimebags. Verizon screwed it up for everybody else and they pissed off a bunch of other ISPs in the process (ISPs who were smart enough to realize they had a pretty good thing going and didn't want Verizon to upset the apple cart).

 

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2014/10/isps-secretly-furious-at-verizon-scared-of-stronger-net-neutrality-rules/

 

Then we get clownshoes like Cruz (who has received a pile of cash from Verizon & Co) pandering to the lowest common denominator with misleading, horrible, wrong information about what net neutrality is and why the FCC was considering reclassification (in a nutshell, the FCC was forced to reclassify because of the Verizon lawsuit).

 

There are two sides to net neutrality:

 

1. Those who understand it and see that government regulation is absolutely needed

 

2. Those who don't understand how the internet works or what series of events led us to this point

 

I have a particular hatred of Ted Cruz because of his net neutrality stance. Again, he's either a liar or incompetent. I'm fine with "less government, more private sector" types... Hell, I used to be adamantly among their ranks, and still am to an extent... But any politician who feeds on the basest insecurities of people the way Cruz does is the lowest of the low in my eyes.

[TheLeviathan]

 

I like that Rand Paul exists. He's the type of guy that keeps other politicians honest, a kind of right-wing equivalent of Bernie Sanders. He bucks his party when he doesn't agree with them and isn't afraid to do things like rant about drone strikes when nobody else is talking about it (but should be talking about it). Congress needs a handful of those people to stir the pot and mess with the establishment.

 

But along with those virtues comes a whole basketful of crazy. Good for Congress, not so good for a leadership role, much less the leadership role.

 

Oh, I agree, but I'd still rather have him than Walker who, from my vantage point, is nothing more than a half-wit puppet put in place by big money.

[Brock Beauchamp]

Oh, I agree, but I'd still rather have him than Walker who, from my vantage point, is nothing more than a half-wit puppet put in place by big money.

I can get behind that. I also think Walker is a half-wit.

[Mike Sixel]

Having spent many years working for what used to be a moderate Republican party, I can safely say that the leadership of the Democratic party is pretty much that party at this point.......

[Squirrel]

 

Having spent many years working for what used to be a moderate Republican party, I can safely say that the leadership of the Democratic party is pretty much that party at this point.......

Yup ... which is why I went off the grid to unaffiliated liberal.   

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Having spent many years working for what used to be a moderate Republican party, I can safely say that the leadership of the Democratic party is pretty much that party at this point.......

I've put a lot of thought into this and that's why I ended up voting mostly blue last election, the first time I've ever done that.

 

The modern Democratic Party is basically the pre-Reagan Republican Party. Even Reagan, who established much of the current GOP's policy, couldn't win a Republican Party nomination in the 21st century because he'd be called that dirtiest of 21st century American words, a "Socialist".

 

Both parties have drifted right in the past 35 years (once you adjust for the continuing leftward shift of social policy that has been in action since the inception of this country). One party, having started further to the right than the other, has drifted over to CrazyTown because of it. The modern GOP is rife with contradictory policy that doesn't make any sense to a person who isn't a partisan.

[TheLeviathan]

I think I agree Brock, the problem is that if the Dems have shifted that way in terms of their ideas/policies, they haven't carried over the more effective policy writing that is generally associated with moderate right-wing politics.  

 

That is my biggest concern with voting left, I've seen so few left-wing policies that were good, effective changes for our country.  I agree with WHAT they want to change, but they are utterly incompetent at drafting policy HOW to achieve it.   So I get torn in the ideals vs. results debate.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

I think I agree Brock, the problem is that if the Dems have shifted that way in terms of their ideas/policies, they haven't carried over the more effective policy writing that is generally associated with moderate right-wing politics.

If Democrat leadership was even half as organized or effective as GOP leadership, we'd be on our third consecutive decade of Democrat domination.

 

The Repubicans remain relevant because of Democratic ineptitude. Repubicans are masters of controlling the conversation while Democratic leadership closely resembles the intro to The Benny Hill Show.

[TheLeviathan]

 

If Democrat leadership was even half as organized or effective as GOP leadership, we'd be on our third consecutive decade of Democrat domination.

 

The Repubicans remain relevant because of Democratic ineptitude. Repubicans are masters of controlling the conversation while Democratic leadership closely resembles the intro to The Benny Hill Show.

 

That's true, but I don't think the problem is their reign being interrupted by right-wingers.  Liberals today just suck so bad at finding effective solutions.  They just seem, as a group, utterly incapable of realizing there is more to solving a problem than shouting about there being a problem.

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

That's true, but I don't think the problem is their reign being interrupted by right-wingers.  Liberals today just suck so bad at finding effective solutions.  They just seem, as a group, utterly incapable of realizing there is more to solving a problem than shouting about there being a problem.

Well, yeah... Maybe I didn't make my point clear. The Democrats are the biggest impediment to their own success but the Republicans are more than happy to help them fail and because the Republicans are so organized and good at controlling the message, they don't have to spend much energy coaxing the Democrats into failure.

 

Outside of the ACA, when was the last time you remember a Democrat suggest a wide-sweeping policy that even came close to reality? The Democrats talk a lot but because they can't organize their own party, the Republicans can generally kill anything the Democrats suggest without even trying very hard.

 

I think the FCC Title II reclassification was able to happen because the Republican Party was napping on the job for once (and I think most of them don't understand the internet well enough and missed what was happening under their noses until it was too late to stop it).

 

Thankfully, they were napping because it's one of the most important rulings in this century.

[TheLeviathan]

 

Well, yeah... Maybe I didn't make my point clear. The Democrats are the biggest impediment to their own success but the Republicans are more than happy to help them fail and because the Republicans are so organized and good at controlling the message, they don't have to spend much energy coaxing the Democrats into failure.

 

Ah, that makes more sense.  See I look at the remnants of The Great Society still infesting our policies and see a cancer that needs to be gutted.  Not because of what they stand for or try to accomplish, but for the horrific way in which they attempt to do so.  From college loans, to welfare, to social security, and I could go on.  There are few of those programs whose intent I disagree with, but they need fixing.  Today's left/Dem party wants to double down on these failures rather than wholesale fix them.

 

That's such a major sticking point for me.

[Squirrel]

 

Ah, that makes more sense.  See I look at the remnants of The Great Society still infesting our policies and see a cancer that needs to be gutted.  Not because of what they stand for or try to accomplish, but for the horrific way in which they attempt to do so.  From college loans, to welfare, to social security, and I could go on.  There are few of those programs whose intent I disagree with, but they need fixing.  Today's left/Dem party wants to double down on these failures rather than wholesale fix them.

 

That's such a major sticking point for me.

I couldn't disagree with this more.  When you want to work on fixing 'horrific' attempts, work on the military budget first and foremost.  The waste in social programs is a drop in the bucket by comparison.  Then work on those programs ... not to gut or delete, but work to make them fair and efficient. 

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

I couldn't disagree with this more.  When you want to work on fixing 'horrific' attempts, work on the military budget first and foremost.  The waste in social programs is a drop in the bucket by comparison.  Then work on those programs ... not to gut or delete, but work to make them fair and efficient. 

This actually ties into my earlier point. Even if the Democrats reasonably approached defense spending, the Republicans have so finely crafted the "liberals hate our troops" message that the Democrats just run around reacting instead of actually driving their message home to Americans (cue Benny Hill Theme again).

 

The Democratic Party leadership is largely incompetent. Even when they come out with progressive ideas, the Republicans respond with demagoguery and send the Democrats into a reactive tailspin. Want to cut defense spending? Well, then... YOU HATE OUR TROOPS. We're going to take that phrase and repeat it literally thousands of times on television in the next month and you're going to stop talking about your proposal and start talking about how you don't really hate the troops at all. Bingo, the Republicans win because the Democrats aren't talking about their proposal, they're talking about the troops. America loves its troops! Boo, Democrats!

 

The Republicans have spent three decades crafting these messages while the Democrats stood by and let it happen. It's no longer a "war on poverty", it's "the poor are freeloaders". It's no longer about individual rights, it's about the freedom of religion (but holy moses, definitely not "freedom from religion"). It's no longer about free market unionization, it's about job creators and how they grace the middle class with jobs. You didn't earn that job, you were gifted it from a benefactor who must be protected at all costs or you'll lose your job and die horribly. The Republicans have about a dozen trite responses to Democratic proposals that never fail to send the Dems into a reactive tailspin.

 

It'd be funny if it wasn't so predictable and sad.

[TheLeviathan]

 

I couldn't disagree with this more.  When you want to work on fixing 'horrific' attempts, work on the military budget first and foremost.  The waste in social programs is a drop in the bucket by comparison.  Then work on those programs ... not to gut or delete, but work to make them fair and efficient. 

 

Work on them is what I want and the military budget should be fair game too.  There shouldn't be any sacred cows.  The problem is neither side really wants to touch the military because it's the equivalent of political suicide.  It shouldn't be, but that's what it is so I don't really hold one side more to blame than the other.  (Though the rhetoric side of the problem is clearly driven by the right)

 

The problem for me is two-fold - Brock is right that the Republicans have branded extremely effective talking points and arguments for winning support.  They are hollow and stupid at their core, but effective.  The other half of that is the best way Democrats can continue to stay in power is to actually craft effective solutions to problems.  I think that's getting better, but there is still a lot of resistance from both sides to a balanced approach.

 

For instance, Dems still believe the best way to fix rising college debt is to "forgive" loans when the real problem is the loan system they put in place in the beginning.  Dems want to get people out of poverty but struggle to craft policy that both gives aid and encourages education or job placement.  They want to improve the education system but are essentially puppets to the teacher's unions.  

 

 

I don't want that to come off as pro-rightwing, because it's not.  I hold the left and Dems to a higher standard because....well look at Ted Cruz and that should explain it.  I want so badly for the Dems and liberalism in general to get my full support but they just do so many stupid things that disappoint me that I'm stuck in the middle.

[Pius Jefferson]

 

I've put a lot of thought into this and that's why I ended up voting mostly blue last election, the first time I've ever done that.

 

The modern Democratic Party is basically the pre-Reagan Republican Party. Even Reagan, who established much of the current GOP's policy, couldn't win a Republican Party nomination in the 21st century because he'd be called that dirtiest of 21st century American words, a "Socialist".

 

 

 

If John McCain, George W Bush and Mitt Romney could win the nomination than Ronald Reagan would breeze through the primaries. The party icon who wouldn't stand a snowball's chance of being picked by their party is John Kennedy. 

[Mike Sixel]

Back on topic......how many Republicans would have to be in the next poll, for Cruz not to be last?

[Brock Beauchamp]

 

Back on topic......how many Republicans would have to be in the next poll, for Cruz not to be last?

Does Michele Bachmann bump him from the bottom of the list? I'm not sure. I consider them two peas in a pod.

[diehardtwinsfan]

I couldn't disagree with this more.  When you want to work on fixing 'horrific' attempts, work on the military budget first and foremost.  The waste in social programs is a drop in the bucket by comparison.  Then work on those programs ... not to gut or delete, but work to make them fair and efficient.

I think you have to work on both. 1/3 of the budget is military related, and you won't be able to balance it without touching all of it. That's my beef. Republicans say, cut social programs, but when push comes to shove, you could kill all of them and still be running a deficit. The Dems just spend more. Nothing the government does is done well. I work in plenty of military institutions, these are not a definition of a well run efficient environment. Our social programs are no different.

 

If this country wants a real place in the world down the road, this problem will need to be fixed.

[Mike Sixel]

If you worked for a huge company, your opinion of what an efficient company/government looks like may change, I've worked in both......

 

but yes, at some point, we all need to agree to fix our budget and other issues, or we'll just be Rome without the buildings that actually last more than 20 years......

[Willihammer]

I don't see how any government program can become more efficient if Congress is allowed to raise the debt limit every year. And I don't know how you get democratically elected lawmakers to self-impose a spending limit.

[PseudoSABR]

A few points:

The left is ineffective at policy largely because they are divergent group; the ideology on the left is extremely diverse and not necessarily universally held.  Not all animal rights people are socialist, not all war-on-poverty people believe in gun control, etc. etc.  The right--either by religion or economic belief--has an incredibly uniform ideology which allows for more refined policy.  

 

The elected-Democrats are appeasers, they champion the comprise not a position.  Take ACA, no one on the left really was for a marketplace with a individual mandate, the Left wanted single payer; but the elected-Dems already pre-comprised and presented the comprise as their position (a Heritage foundation idea no less).  It should have been no surprise that the Right vilified ACA ever as much as they would have single-payer.  Appeasement makes for bad policy; just like consensus does.  Consensus type policy pleases everyone who votes for it but the policy consensus makes is not designed to actually function either efficiently or efficaciously.  (Another example, welfare.  The Left doesn't want to give a man fish (the handout/food stamps), the Left wants to teach a man to fish;  the former however is far cheaper (in the short term at least) than the latter.  Handouts are cheaper than training or WPA programs or day care or actual policy.  That's were consensus leads us, cheap policy to fix expensive problems).

 

What makes Warren so attractive is that her candidacy probably has real policy behind it that isn't cowed to appeasement or consensus.  But the thing is, the liberals that actually can write (or champion) functional policy don't get elected, and the mechanism of congress would dilute whatever policy might stand a chance of passing. 

 

I think the best thing for this country might to have Cruz has the GOP nominee; let's actually expose the ideas of teh far right to public debate, rather than the echo chamber.  I under why so many can get behind the value system exposed by Cruz and his ilk, but I doubt those who champion Cruz realize how poorly such ideas would play out, and how unpopular they would be to the majority of Americans.

[Hrbowski]

 

If John McCain, George W Bush and Mitt Romney could win the nomination than Ronald Reagan would breeze through the primaries. The party icon who wouldn't stand a snowball's chance of being picked by their party is John Kennedy. 

 

Yeah, JFK was one of my favorites all time, and I would probably still be a Democrat if they were still running on his platform.

[Hrbowski]

 

Does Michele Bachmann bump him from the bottom of the list? I'm not sure. I consider them two peas in a pod.

Actually I have always thought Michele to be not as smart as Cruz and that she did poorly in debates, while I always was impressed with Cruz's debating skills, even back from his days at Princeton.

[Hrbowski]

 

Back on topic......how many Republicans would have to be in the next poll, for Cruz not to be last?

I saw a poll on NewsMax the other day with about 15 candidates and he was 2nd, only to Mitt Romney.

[TheLeviathan]

 

A few points:

The left is ineffective at policy largely because they are divergent group; the ideology on the left is extremely diverse and not necessarily universally held.  Not all animal rights people are socialist, not all war-on-poverty people believe in gun control, etc. etc.  The right--either by religion or economic belief--has an incredibly uniform ideology which allows for more refined policy.  

 

 

I know this is off the Ted Cruz topic but let's face it, politics is always going to weave on and off topic.  This is interesting to me.  Pseudo, I don't think that's completely fair, I think there are uniform beliefs on both sides at the heart of both sides.  The issues less at the core of both sides tend to diverge more, which I think your examples illustrate.  But yes, there are more examples of that on the left largely because of the religious angle I think.

 

Part of the problem on policy, I agree, is compromise.  The right certainly influences some of the problems in left-wing policy in a bad way, no doubt about it.  The problem the left has is paving the road for their vision.  Again I encourage looking at college debt as the ultimate example of liberals drunk at the wheel and how similar that is to many social programs.  Starts with a good premise (We want people to be able to go to college if they want if they otherwise cannot afford to) but then goes too far.  Rather than find a neatly tailored method for doing this we get some ham-handed "here's a whole bunch of virtually unregulated money!" and the thoughts on the consequences of that are all but ignored in the name of the ideal.  And anyone that questions the method gets painted as anti-poor or minority.  (Not....you know...this is just a super crappy way of helping the poor and minorities)

 

Result: Now everyone can go to college, but it costs exponentially more, has lined the pockets of already rich people on the backs of the young and poor and minorities, crippled spending power for an entire generation, weakened the quality of college education in order to keep mouths at the trough, and made college degrees far less meaningful, and now we want to spend another giant pile of money to patch the bleeding but not fix the true source of the problem.

 

I mean...UGH!  There is just something about that constant cycle with liberal policy that drives me up a wall.  I want so badly to get in line behind the ideals but this keeps happening over and over again and no one seems to learn their lesson.  So frustrating - maybe the left-wing needs to really embrace libertarians instead.  I could get behind that, sober both groups up a bit.

[PseudoSABR]

The Left may have some unifying underlying belief, but the problem is each individual liberal has a different idea of how to go about realizing those beliefs and where to begin.  The Right is largely on the same page--esp. with the emphasis on small government and deregulation.  Policy that limits government action (e.g. policy-making) does not require the same bureaucratic depth that social program policy or regulation. 

 

I think the Left wants higher education to be free, without the need to go into debt. It's certainly not a liberal idea to get the banks involved in the pursuit of higher education.  The loan-higher education thing is more consensus/appeasement thinking.   It's not a comprise between liberal and conservative values, rather it's each side appeasing to base continents (the poor and the banks respectively).   

 

It is probably true that liberals would support loan-financing for higher education than choose a system that would provide no, or little, means for low-income kids to attend college.  But that doesn't mean that choice represents liberal policy as they would have it.  

 

 

[TheLeviathan]

 

It is probably true that liberals would support loan-financing for higher education than choose a system that would provide no, or little, means for low-income kids to attend college.  But that doesn't mean that choice represents liberal policy as they would have it.  

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higher_Education_Act_of_1965

 

It sort of was the choice.  It's been reinforced by the "solutions" being bandied about now, none of them include cutting off the problem at it's source.  The entire problem the left has in being more effective is that the means get lost in the end and anyone that criticizes the means gets labeled some pretty awful things.

 

That really, really needs to change because it's the key to crafting good policy.  Not everyone that is critical of left-wing policy is some idiot like Ted Cruz.  (Even if many of them, including most of the other party, are)  

[Pius Jefferson]

People are delusional in this thread. There is only one

 

Actually I have always thought Michele to be not as smart as Cruz and that she did poorly in debates, while I always was impressed with Cruz's debating skills, even back from his days at Princeton.

 

Alan Dershowitz called Ted Cruz the smartest law student he's ever taught. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[diehardtwinsfan]

 

If you worked for a huge company, your opinion of what an efficient company/government looks like may change, I've worked in both......

 

but yes, at some point, we all need to agree to fix our budget and other issues, or we'll just be Rome without the buildings that actually last more than 20 years......

I've worked in 2 fortune 100 firms and several companies in between.  I know a dysfunctional organization when I see one, and the DoD makes every other place I've been look very well run.  I get that they all have their issues and plenty of waste on their own, and I agree, but the government takes it to the extreme. 

[Willihammer]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higher_Education_Act_of_1965

The 14th citation has it nailed down.

 

http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1941070

 

 

However, Federal Student Loan programs have not incorporated many recent insights from financial, developmental, and labor economics that distinguish between different types of education. Because of this, Federal Student Loan programs, and more broadly, U.S. labor markets, are not performing at their full potential. There is a large mismatch between the skills workers have and employers’ needs, and this mismatch contributes to structural unemployment, reduced output, and higher student loan defaults.

 

This article argues that introducing risk-based pricing in federal student loans would advance the interests and values that Congress articulated when it first established Federal support for Higher Education. Risk-based pricing of student loans would signal the long-term financial risks inherent in different courses of study. This price signal would likely improve students’ ability to make informed decisions about the course of study that would best balance their innate abilities and individual preferences with postgraduate economic opportunities. Similarly, price signals would enhance post-secondary educational institutions’ ability to adjust their programs to improve their students’ postgraduate prospects.