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Interesting question posed by a friend that I thought I'd share
Obama supporters: Say its nearing November. Unemployment has spiked to 12%. GDP growth is negative. The percentage of Americans in the labor force has reached a new low. The stock market has once again plummeted. Election day is coming up. Do you continue to vote for Obama, or do you vote for Mitt Romney?
Romney supporters: It's almost election day. GDP growth is at 4%, and on the rise. A new era of prosperity is emerging. Unemployment is down to 5% and all signs show that we will soon be returning to full employment. The stock market is very healthy and vibrant. Do you continue to vote for Romney, or do you vote to re-elect Barack Obama.
Obviously, in scenario one Romney would win and in scenario two Obama would win. Neither scenario will happen. But suppose it did happen. What would it take for you to change your vote? My guess is that most people on this forum would not change their vote. The most politically engaged tend to be the most partisan, or at least the most firm in their opinions. I expect Obama supporters to say "Yeah, that sucks, but Romney would just make it worse" and Romney supporters to say "Of course it would be wonderful if that could happen in spite of Obama, but I know Romney can sustain it and make it even better."
You can vote in the poll, but I would also like to see you elaborate on the answer if you wish, especially if your answer is "no." If that's teh case, what, if anything, would get you to vote for the other guy
I post the poll with these two candidates because they are the presumptive nominees. Even if you personally think Ron Paul will emerge victorious, this poll is about the two candidates declared the presumptive nominees. I know Paul supporters will vote for their guy anyways, we hear it all the time so it would almost be pointless to ask. But if you are a Paul supporter, I would love to hear your opinion on what it would take to get you to change your vote, if anything.
Your hypothetical scenarios are rather biased toward Romney and are akin to heads i win tails you lose.
I believe in Liberal ideology and not conservative ideology so i cant think of much that would turn me into a conservative.
So long as those corporations do what they do best, I don't have a problem with them either. But, whey they set out to subvert my free government for their own benefit, they've gotten on my bad side and will remain there.
I don't want MY country run by THEM without my grandkids or great-grandkids having any say in the matter. Do you?
I'm with you, Stillkit, but here's the thing: the single biggest blow to corporate influence on government would be a complete overhaul of the tax code, with all the garbage and special breaks and exemptions and carve-outs taken out, marginal rates lowered, and more dollars collected.
Obama LOVES crapping up the tax code. Nearly every month he promotes some new policy that would add dozens more pages to the tax code in order to punish some enemy or reward some friend. The bastardization of the tax code is the primary source of government power, which gets rented to the highest bidder. Corporations that play and win get a huge advantage over corporations that don't: the whole system of business and government gets corrupted.
The magic of every bipartisan commission or group that has studied our major problems, from Domenici-Rivlin to Simpson Bowles to the Gang of Six, is that they all recommend this source of corruption be eliminated. Lower marginal rates would reduce the pressure for breaks and carveouts and exemptions; when they are taken off the table, business can tend to business instead of buying legislators.
This is the major structural problem with our government; the incumbent president runs the opposite direction from every attempt to solve it; the other candidate may not do anything about it either--but he is not on record as a staunch opponent of needed reform as the incumbent is.
So we share some of the same motivations, but have drawn vastly different conclusions as to what should come next.
I'm with you, Stillkit, but here's the thing: the single biggest blow to corporate influence on government would be a complete overhaul of the tax code, with all the garbage and special breaks and exemptions and carve-outs taken out, marginal rates lowered, and more dollars collected.
Obama LOVES crapping up the tax code. Nearly every month he promotes some new policy that would add dozens more pages to the tax code in order to punish some enemy or reward some friend. The bastardization of the tax code is the primary source of government power, which gets rented to the highest bidder. Corporations that play and win get a huge advantage over corporations that don't: the whole system of business and government gets corrupted.
The magic of every bipartisan commission or group that has studied our major problems, from Domenici-Rivlin to Simpson Bowles to the Gang of Six, is that they all recommend this source of corruption be eliminated. Lower marginal rates would reduce the pressure for breaks and carveouts and exemptions; when they are taken off the table, business can tend to business instead of buying legislators.
This is the major structural problem with our government; the incumbent president runs the opposite direction from every attempt to solve it; the other candidate may not do anything about it either--but he is not on record as a staunch opponent of needed reform as the incumbent is.
So we share some of the same motivations, but have drawn vastly different conclusions as to what should come next.
No President can solve the tax code problem. It takes Congress to do that and every time the subject comes up, they hear from us. Everyone, including you and I, have some tax advantage we don't want to surrender. As with everything else on the subject of spending and taxation, it's a case of NIMBY.
Yet, look at the past. Even in spite of the screwed up tax codes, the country still manages to bring in enough revenue to fund itself in good economic times. Perhaps the proof is in the pudding, not in the theory of taxation.
blindly following parties is the dumbest thing you can do for the country.
For example I am Supporting Romney for President, and until recently Warren (D) for senate because I think (thought) they where be better canidate.
I don't trust the Republican party to do what's in my best interest and it's as simple as that. While I may vote for a Republican candidate on a local level, there's absolutely no way I'd vote a Republican in as President as my thoughts and beliefs do not align whatsoever with the thoughts and beliefs of the Republican party in general.
Even though a Republican presidential candidate may do a good job, I'm fully aware that the President appoints judges to the Supreme Ct. and I'm not willing to risk the President putting some right wing, neo-con radical on the bench (so they can attempt to turn the US back to the way it was in the 1950s).
Last edited by midatlantic12; 05-08-2012 at 06:40 AM..
Interesting question posed by a friend that I thought I'd share
Obama supporters: Say its nearing November. Unemployment has spiked to 12%. GDP growth is negative. The percentage of Americans in the labor force has reached a new low. The stock market has once again plummeted. Election day is coming up. Do you continue to vote for Obama, or do you vote for Mitt Romney?
Romney supporters: It's almost election day. GDP growth is at 4%, and on the rise. A new era of prosperity is emerging. Unemployment is down to 5% and all signs show that we will soon be returning to full employment. The stock market is very healthy and vibrant. Do you continue to vote for Romney, or do you vote to re-elect Barack Obama.
Obviously, in scenario one Romney would win and in scenario two Obama would win. Neither scenario will happen. But suppose it did happen. What would it take for you to change your vote? My guess is that most people on this forum would not change their vote. The most politically engaged tend to be the most partisan, or at least the most firm in their opinions. I expect Obama supporters to say "Yeah, that sucks, but Romney would just make it worse" and Romney supporters to say "Of course it would be wonderful if that could happen in spite of Obama, but I know Romney can sustain it and make it even better."
You can vote in the poll, but I would also like to see you elaborate on the answer if you wish, especially if your answer is "no." If that's teh case, what, if anything, would get you to vote for the other guy
I post the poll with these two candidates because they are the presumptive nominees. Even if you personally think Ron Paul will emerge victorious, this poll is about the two candidates declared the presumptive nominees. I know Paul supporters will vote for their guy anyways, we hear it all the time so it would almost be pointless to ask. But if you are a Paul supporter, I would love to hear your opinion on what it would take to get you to change your vote, if anything.
I will never vote for Obama or any other Democrat.
No matter how bad the economy it is simple fact that running a government is not like running a business.
The idea that Romney could revamp the economy with good business practices is just plain silly. The fact is Romney is a vulture capitalist who makes his money by closing down factories, outsourcing jobs, or restructuring that involves cuts in benefits and wages. Under Romney many more people would lose their jobs, services would be cut, and Social Security and Medicare would be attacked.
As Romney has said, corporations are people and entitled to the rights of individuals, he likes firing people, and his wife is just like the average American housewife as she drives one of her two Cadillac
around town.
President Obama may not have done as well for the country as we would have liked but to elect Romney is worse that going from the frying pan to the fire unless you in that 1% group.
I don't trust the Republican party to do what's in my best interest and it's as simple as that. While I may vote for a Republican candidate on a local level, there's absolutely no way I'd vote a Republican in as President as my thoughts and beliefs do not align whatsoever with the thoughts and beliefs of the Republican party in general.
Even though a Republican presidential candidate may do a good job, I'm fully aware that the President appoints judges to the Supreme Ct. and I'm not willing to risk the President putting some right wing, neo-con radical on the bench (so they can attempt to turn the US back to the way it was in the 1950s).
This^^
I have voted Republican in the past, and I would again if I saw major changes in the party. They have been kowtowing to the extreme right wing for far too long for me to be comfortable with voting Republican. I am certainly a fiscal conservative but neither party is going to stop spending enough to create a budget surplus, and frankly I'd rather us spend the money on well-intentioned (though admittedly flawed) social programs to help give the lower classes a hand up (not a hand out), than spend the money on endless wars and bailing out Wall Street. It also makes me extremely nervous how the Republican party has focused so much on "moral" issues this election cycle (how is "small government" going to monitor everyone's sexual activities?) and how there are so many bills in the states requiring non elective, non diagnostic, invasive transvaginal ultrasounds prior to abortion procedures (speaking as someone who had 2 of these types of ultrasounds due to problems with an early pregnancy I ended up miscarrying - it was awful even when it HAD to be done). And there are a myriad of other things that bother me about the Republican party. I don't like the way they disparage education and educated people to appeal to the uneducated segment of their base. I don't like them turning a blind eye to scientific facts just because they may be inconvenient to the oil companies' plans. And so on and so on...
Interesting question posed by a friend that I thought I'd share
Obama supporters: Say its nearing November. Unemployment has spiked to 12%. GDP growth is negative. The percentage of Americans in the labor force has reached a new low. The stock market has once again plummeted. Election day is coming up. Do you continue to vote for Obama, or do you vote for Mitt Romney?
Romney supporters: It's almost election day. GDP growth is at 4%, and on the rise. A new era of prosperity is emerging. Unemployment is down to 5% and all signs show that we will soon be returning to full employment. The stock market is very healthy and vibrant. Do you continue to vote for Romney, or do you vote to re-elect Barack Obama.
Obviously, in scenario one Romney would win and in scenario two Obama would win. Neither scenario will happen. But suppose it did happen. What would it take for you to change your vote? My guess is that most people on this forum would not change their vote. The most politically engaged tend to be the most partisan, or at least the most firm in their opinions. I expect Obama supporters to say "Yeah, that sucks, but Romney would just make it worse" and Romney supporters to say "Of course it would be wonderful if that could happen in spite of Obama, but I know Romney can sustain it and make it even better."
You can vote in the poll, but I would also like to see you elaborate on the answer if you wish, especially if your answer is "no." If that's teh case, what, if anything, would get you to vote for the other guy
I post the poll with these two candidates because they are the presumptive nominees. Even if you personally think Ron Paul will emerge victorious, this poll is about the two candidates declared the presumptive nominees. I know Paul supporters will vote for their guy anyways, we hear it all the time so it would almost be pointless to ask. But if you are a Paul supporter, I would love to hear your opinion on what it would take to get you to change your vote, if anything.
If I had to choose only between those 2 I would vote for Obama but I am not planning to vote for either of them. They both suck. Obama makes great speeches but he is a big failure as a leader as far as I am concerned. He has no convictions, twist in the political winds and hides from any controversy at all. The Republicans steam roll him everytime. He is basically a 3rd term of W as far as I am concerned. He is a sorry excuse as a President. On the other hand we have a candidate that also changes positions more often than the weather in Nebraska, professes his love of America but keeps his money overseas, says he wants more jobs in the USA but has spent most of his life sending jobs to China and created Obamacare and now says he opposes it. I don't trust him at all.
Since I vote for people based on their record of action and accomplishments and not on what they say, nothing would change my vote.
This is the record I'm voting against:
1. waivers from Obamacare for unions and AARP who cheerleaded it for everyone else. (Okay for thee but not for me.)
2. bailouts for fat cat corporations while mouthing class warfare rhetoric.
3. subsidizing Fisker (with taxpayer money) that makes $104,000 luxury green cars only rich guys can afford.
4. the "stimulus" pork like turtle tunnels and that darn "shovel-ready" factor that apparently didn't exist.
5. cash for clunkers stimulating profits for foreign car makers.
6. Solyndra cronyism.
7. the Fast and Furious scandal.
8. shutting down oil drilling in the Gulf by inserting "a moratorium" into the researchers report that they never suggested.
9. appointing a tax cheat to oversee the IRS.
10. snitch (flag) at white house dot gov encouraging people to rat out to the administration what people said about Obamacare.
11. knowingly having a self-avowed communist (the guy was on video saying it the same time Jarrett was saying the now Obama administration had been having their collective eye on Jones for years), in his administration.
12. giving money to Brazil to do the exact same deep sea oil drilling he forbid in our country.
13. the Keystone pipeline fiasco mention that he'd make up his mind after the election.
14. increasing the national debt more in 3 years than Bush did in 8 years.
15. ignoring his own committee recommendations for getting a handle on the national debt.
16. failing to produce a budget for two years when Democrats were in charge of the White House, the House and the Senate.
17. cutting off the voucher program for poor black DC schoolchildren who were doing well in their private schools because the teachers unions have Obama in their pocket.
18. Having the goons in the NLRB trying to manage Boeing's expansion operation into South Carolina because the union thugs in Washington state have Obama in their pocket.
19. Making Muslim outreach, NASA's top priority.
20. Actively looking to increase the number of food stamp recipients because the Agriculture Secretary (Vilsac) says it stimulates the economy (as opposed to, you know, stimulating Democrat voting).
21. Shutting down coal mining just like he promised before he was elected because you know, that electricity that powers the Volt he pushes apparently grows on trees.
22. RAH RAHing, the Arab Spring. Giving the world The Muslim Brotherhood and Sharia Law in charge of Egypt while at the same time saying the Republican's are the ones at war with women.
23. Going to war in Libya...speaking of going to war, let's add the Obama war on Arizona, the war on the Chamber of Commerce, the war on Las Vegas, war on the family farm, war on domestic energy production, the war on Israel, war on the Gibson guitar, the war on rich people who are not campaign contributors, the war on school kid lunches, the war on the Supreme Court, war on school vouchers, war on guns, war on religion, the war on coal, the war on small business, etc.
24. The White House gifts. The Best of Barack Obama Speeches for the Queen, the DVDs (and in the wrong format) for Gordon Brown.
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