O makes O sound bad. The "what I meant was" spin on "you can keep your health plan" is a perfect example.

That's your belief. It's not shared by everyone, or even the majority. In fact, most places that have voted have voted against your opinion. It's only some of the courts that are in your favor, and that kind of lawmaking from the courts should be abhorrent to all of us.

That's not even the point. It could have been any political issue. What was done by activists in getting him removed was completely inappropriate.

Eich didn't stand down on his own, he was forced to. We all know it. He didn't accept the job and then just suddenly change his mind. He was forced out. Rather than take a long battle through the courts, he walked away to move on to something else, rather than get stuck on this issue for years. He's the only one involved that had any dignity.

As for paranoia.. no. If they are now in the business of social activism, they cannot be trusted. CA law states that workers cannot be punished for political donations, but that didn't stop anyone. There is no reason to believe that they would not go data mining for other people to punish under the mantra of "progress". Their organization and their products are toxic.

None of the legislators had even read the bill because it was thousands of pages long and there were multiple different versions of it roaming around. Pelosi's remarks aren't out of context. She was trying to tell the public that they should just accept it and then hope they like it. Everyday, it seemed, someone was finding some new gem hidden in the reams of legislation. Not only that, it doesn't even define everything. Newly created boards would get to make rules after the fact. That's incredibly dangerous if you consider stunts that the FCC and FAA make in asserting control over things that really shouldn't fall to them.

As for those without insurance, it would have cost far less to just buy them health insurance. Instead, it was used as a pretext to seize control of the health insurance industry. That's why the public option was so toxic. It would have been used to wipe the sector out and establish full government control. The VA regularly fails out veterans, no one wants that to be the only health care option.

Insurance does have a role, whether you want to accept it or not. They keep costs down. They negotiate lower rates on behalf of the insured. Look at what health care facilities bill, and then look at the amount they actually get paid. Cross the insurers out of that equation, we pay the full ride. That's not a great idea.

The Massachusetts law should have been looked at more closely because even it didn't live up to its promises. ER visits went up, not down. It became much harder to find a primary care provider, and appointments took longer to get. It missed on a list of things that it was supposed to accomplish, so much so that the feds gave MA a huge chunk of money to keep it going so that it would not be a distraction while the AHA was being argued.

The free market style solution that the GOP and its constituents wanted was the free market. There's a significant number of people that didn't want the federal government intruding into health care this way. I'm one of them. This is a state matter. Romney did the right thing in dealing with it at the state level. A local solution is a better solution. The Dems did everything possible to ram this through, including unseating Dems, trying to bribe legislators with bennies for their state, they even held congress over on holiday so they wouldn't be able to hear from their constituents opposing the bill. The whole thing was a disaster.

I'll grant you the one compromise the Dems did make was to drop the "public option". Beyond that, it was "my way or the highway" from the Dems and the President. Face it, the coming together meeting they had with the GOP was for the President to remind McCain who won the election. It was disgraceful.

As for the debt ceiling, there had been government shutdowns before, and there will be again. It's an ugly tool, but it is a tool when all other options fail. What's awful is that the parks service mobilized workers to close parks and historic sites even when there was normally no park service presence at the location. They even locked the veterans out of their own memorial. Horrible way to handle it. The GOP was pushing hard, but the administration's attempts to make people feel pain was far worse, IMO.

He has a right to his beliefs, same as everyone else. An organization like Mozilla should be especially careful not to take sides on politics. Now they can legitimately be seen as a social justice organization. They now have a record of using someone's personal information against them. Who knows what person will be their next target or whether or not they'll use their software products to snoop on whom they perceive to be the enemy. There were plenty of people on the left who didn't like what happened because it is very much counterproductive. A free and open Internet isn't served by this kind of behavior.

There will be a fee, no a fine.. no a fee on your annual income tax if you don't buy the correct bundle.

Nobody cared in Massachusetts because the vast majority of the population already had health insurance. There was no significant number of folks that would be on the receiving end of someone else's paycheck. It wasn't as broad reaching either. There was no "you have to pass the law to find out what's in it."

Right, because saying that Republicans would have to "ride in the back of the bus" was his way of expressing how open he was going to be in negotiating legislation with the other party. Both sides refused to talk to each other. Forcing the AHA through without any Republican votes was the final straw. You can't pull a stunt like that and expect people to want to cooperate on anything else. The only compromise the President is interested in is his objectors ceding to his argument.

If you like your Internet service, you can keep it. Period.

They probably wouldn't last long in the prison's general population. Would you want to be mixed with violent offenders?

Was it okay to push Mozilla's CEO out of a job because he donated to a political cause? That was all about public shame, and illegal under CA law.

Everyone should have a work license then. Any company could be employing underage persons.

Yes, I do. Internet at home is a luxury. If you want it for free, go to the library. That's what the universal service fee is for.

The media eventually got this data on Tim Murray's car after he had a crash. He was the Lt. Governor of Massachusetts. He was driving way too fast on public roads and tried to lie about it. It's obscene how much effort the media had to put in to get the data, but they got it.

Sure, either that or reckless driving.

Police generally have a track or other private area to train on. Public roads aren't it.