Are Republicans mean?

Yeah, you're right. They just said over and over and over and over that they cared about it. They never really did; the liars.

If it weren't for the bribes in the healthcare bill I probably could have supported it (the house version). I do wish it had a lot more though.

I don't see how Reps can be described other than being mean. They opposed civil rights, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and, now, HC reform. But they are never mean to rich corporations and individuals. Bush and the Reps employed reconciliation to get through their big tax cuts for the super-rich. Regarding health-care reform, it is of no moment to them that 45,000 are dying every year due to lack of coverage, most personal bankrupticies are due to medical bills, more employers are dropping HC, etc.

Johnson has gone down in the history books as the big spender for social welfare programs, yet federal spending grew faster during Nixon’s tenure than during Johnson’s. It was under Nixon that social spending came to exceed defense spending for the first time. Social spending soared from $55 billion in 1970 (Nixon’s first budget) to $132 billion in 1975, from 28 percent of the federal budget when LBJ left office to 40 percent of the budget by the time Nixon left in 1974. While Nixon would criticize and attempt to reform welfare, he nonetheless approved massive increases in funding for other Great Society programs such as the Model Cities program and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Some of the changes in spending policies that Nixon supported, such as automatic cost-of-living increases for Social Security recipients and other entitlement programs, contributed to runaway spending trends in successive decades. Federal spending for the arts, which went mostly to cultural elites who hated Nixon, quadrupled.

In civil rights, Nixon expanded the regime of "affirmative action" racial quotas and set-asides far beyond what Johnson had done.

Nixon’s liberal domestic policy inclinations therefore remain his greatest mystery.

Steven Hayward is senior fellow at the Pacific Research Institute, and an adjunct fellow of the Ashbrook Center.

I am a registered Republican and I am in favor of civil rights, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and, now, HC reform. This also describes about half of my friends.

Brandon9000 wrote:

I am a registered Republican and I am in favor of civil rights, social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and, now, HC reform. This also describes about half of my friends.

I would love to see a conservative spell out the conservative basis for health care reform. I know lots of conservatives who want health care reform and there are several, solid conservative reasons why health care reform (or more like health insurance reform) fit well within that camp. My conservative health care argument looks like: The current system
- Makes people pay for expensive indigent care through high rates and distorts the free market
- Saddles businesses with unpredictable expenses that competitors in other countries don't have to account for.
- Results in more worker sick days directly reducing US employee productivity.
- Encourages very expensive emergency care over preventive care.

Providing basic health care:
- Is completely in line with main line Christian doctrine. "Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. "
- Meets the spirit of the Constitution whose purpose as stated in the Preamble is to "provide for the common defense, promote the general warfare and secure the blessings of liberty for ourselves and our posterity."

If it weren't for the bribes in the healthcare bill I probably could have supported it (the house version). I do wish it had a lot more though.

Undoubtedly, there are some Republican exceptions to the rule that they are downright mean, and these exceptions prove the rule that Republicans are mean.

My basis is that people shouldn't have to forego medicine or go deeply into debt to get it.

Brandon9000 wrote:

My basis is that people shouldn't have to forego medicine or go deeply into debt to get it.

That is the liberal argument for health care.

engineer wrote:

Brandon9000 wrote:

My basis is that people shouldn't have to forego medicine or go deeply into debt to get it.

That is the liberal argument for health care.

Since it is also my argument, perhaps you are laboring under a naive or self-serving definition of conservatives.