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I was impressed with President Obama's state of the union speech because he both addressed the progress that the nation has taken and where he wants us to go next. I also appreciate his reminding us all that the progress hasn't been as great as he would like because of the immenseness of the problems he inherited. 

The Republicans continue to act like bullies on the playground. They did this with Carter and Clinton. Nothing they could do was good enough, even though both presidents had major problems to fix with the exit of the previous Republican presidents. The Republicans distracted both presidents with spurious attacks that hamstrung their power. Clinton had to give up on the health care reform that Republicans want to prevent. I'm glad Obama will not give up. We desperately need this reform. The big business of health insurance doesn't want reform because they will lose power and money.

Calling Obama a whiner is an example of bully behavior. Of course, it is appropriate for the President to acknowledge the previous problems because they require context for the current situation. The Republicans don't like to be reminded of that so they call names.

When will we have adults involved in the political discourse. I want to hear the Republicans acknowledge that our previous president left major problems and that we all need to work hard to correct them. Stop distracting us from working on problems.

posted 3 years, 3 months ago
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I was a college student in Richmond, Va during the late sixties. My brother was in Vietnam, I grew up in a military family, and I was a nursing student in Richmond seeing black people treated in separate wards in the hospital with inferior equipment and care. I watched the protests against the war and about civil rights across the street from my dorm at city hall. I saw how people villified returning soldiers and I watched war scenes on TV with my mother crying while searching for her son in those news clips. What I found was that the extremes of the war scared me, did not solve my moral dilemma, and alienated me. Whereas the real life images of black people being mistreated mobilized me to fight for civil rights. I was arrested in those protests and felt I was doing good. I think my protests there did bring about some change in society. However, what happened with the Vietnam war protests divided our society and hurt our soldiers. They did not bring us home.

I think showing dead fetus and referring to first term abortion as baby killing is also alienating and frightening to young people. It has divided our society and not changed us. Showing shoes and boots puts a less dramatic human face (or foot) on the war, tee shirts on a clothesline with names of victims and survivors of domestic violence puts a face on domestic violence in a humane way. The Right To Life movement needs to learn from this and consider a humane way to protest.

posted 3 years, 10 months ago
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As long as sex motivates behavior we will have these event occur throughout all elements of society. Why do we think politics should be different? From my hearing of the press conference the man bringing these charges against Adams has/had a financial interest; Adams has a political interest. These two counter each other and what the Atty Gen came up with is reasonable. Do I think Adams misbehaved, of course? Do I care? No. We need to get over our contradictory puritanism and let government proceed.

posted 3 years, 11 months ago
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I listened to the speeches last night and noticed a common theme that seems to perpetually permeate Republican economic comments. When they oppose tax increases, they really mean tax increases to big business CEOs and companies but they don't say that. I am middle class just scraping by with two jobs and a decent salary. However, the cost of gas & groceries just blow me out of the water. I don't know how larger families do it. Then I hear that the health insurance CEOs get $1 million bonuses last year but scream about the high cost of health care (of which I am both a provider & consumer). Then I look at how those same insurance companies discount my reimbursement for health care provided to clients by 30%. So where is the money going from the insurance premiums that my clients pay or their business owners pay and the discounted reimbursement for my services? Obviously that bonus check has to be paid. Why doesn't that CEO feel the pinch from the recession as well as we little folks? Why do the oil companies still make a big profit while my cost to fill up my tank increases? Shouldn't the companies share the burden of costs?

posted 4 years, 8 months ago
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