President Obama Mulling Preventative Detention

[guido911]

You don't agree?  I'd think you'd be able to see, as an attorney, how difficult mounting a prosecution of one of these people would be.  And it didn't have to be.

But you're being disingenuous.  The other half of my post was about how Obama is also culpable if he chooses to go forward with indefinite detention.  It would make two cowardly administrations in a row, and that's where the real shame lies.

[Conan71]

You don't agree?  I'd think you'd be able to see, as an attorney, how difficult mounting a prosecution of one of these people would be.  And it didn't have to be.

But you're being disingenuous.  The other half of my post was about how Obama is also culpable if he chooses to go forward with indefinite detention.  It would make two cowardly administrations in a row, and that's where the real shame lies.

Slight problem to these prosecutions: this isn't like a murder trial in district court.  The process is nowhere near as simple and I'm not going to to second guess either administration on this.  There's apparently good reason for these people to be detained or President Obama would not have continued the policies of The Bush administration.  The idealism and the reality of national security are two entirely different things.

[guido911]

What "mulling" over preventive detention looks like:



Or is that arrogance or pomposity.

[nathanm]

What "mulling" over preventive detention looks like:

Or is that arrogance or pomposity.

Now that is some real ODS you got going on there. A person clears their mind and it's arrogance or pomposity. I guess you've never closed your eyes, either. 

[Red Arrow]

I guess you've never closed your eyes, either. 

I just try to keep the boss from catching me. (With my eyes closed.)

[nathanm]

Looking at images like that is so much fun. It's endlessly entertaining to switch your perception of the hands from wig wagging to circling the head clockwise to circling the head counterclockwise. Such a brain challenge.

[guido911]

Now that is some real ODS you got going on there. A person clears their mind and it's arrogance or pomposity. I guess you've never closed your eyes, either. 

Now that is some real OSS (Obama Spooning Syndrome: characterized by endless fawning and adoration by one man to another) you and others in this thread to a harmless comment about Obama.

[nathanm]

Now that is some real OSS (Obama Spooning Syndrome: characterized by endless fawning and adoration by one man to another) you and others in this thread to a harmless comment about Obama.

Whatever. I criticize him regularly. His so-called health care "reform" is a giveaway to the insurance companies. Not quite as big a giveaway as Medicare Part D, but saying "Bush did it worse!" is no defense.

[guido911]

Whatever. I criticize him regularly. His so-called health care "reform" is a giveaway to the insurance companies. Not quite as big a giveaway as Medicare Part D, but saying "Bush did it worse!" is no defense.

Are you more public option or single payer or "leave it the frak alone"?

[nathanm]

Are you more public option or single payer or "leave it the frak alone"?

I'd be fine with a public option, but I think single payer would, at least temporarily, be the best way to get things under control while we solve the underlying issues. As it stands, at least half of the country supports single payer in polls, and over 75% support a public option. The main resistance is coming from those financed by the health care lobbies; that is to say, mainly our elected representatives.

I think "leave it alone" is preferable to the giveaway without a public option. That said, I think a forced buy-in is to some degree criminalizing being poor. Nobody should have to choose between food on the table or clothes to wear and paying the insurance bill to keep the government off their back. At the same time, it is to some degree a person's own fault they are too proud or whatever to take advantage of the help that is available to them, as I've seen so many fail to do. (Although that's largely because of the Reaganite demonization of those who accept government help as 'welfare queens')

My hope with the public option is that it will at least help keep the insurance companies honest. It's sad, but I trust credit card companies to not screw me over more than I do insurance companies. At least the credit card thugs follow the rules they write and make it reasonably obvious what you have to do to avoid getting an donkey reaming from them. With health insurance companies regularly exercising the recission clause over immaterial misstatements on the application and not making it obvious they even have that right, I have much less sympathy for their so-called plight.

In short, I think the President's plan is by far the worst of single payer, mandatory buy-in, and what we have now. The public option just makes it not quite an unmitigated disaster.

Part of Obama's problem is that he (like the Congressional dems) is trying to be bipartisan when the other side isn't at all interested in playing ball. He won't get the Republican votes in Congress no matter what he does.

Right now I think both parties are in the toilet, especially on this issue.