The 2008 presidential field at-a-glance

[bluefish81]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

Are you saying that had the tax cut not been passed we'd be all set with social security and health care?

Who was responsible for passing the tax cut into law? Who would have been responsible for making sure that the money in the federal coffers, had the tax cut not gone into effect, went to shoring up Social Security or God forbid, Federal health care benefits? What evidence can you point to of a willingness on the part of Congress to any of the things necessary to yield the results that Skylark wanted to see?

Certainly, a reasonable person can conclude that Bush provided bad leadership, but so much more than that went into it.

No, I was not saying that if the tax cut had not been passed, we'd be all set for Social Security, and I don't interpret that from Skylark's post either. Perhaps we just read that statement differently, which is fine.

Both political parties have robbed Social Security over the years to pay for lot of different things, hopefully no one denies that. I think I've heard they're estimating that Social Security will be completely depleted by what 2040?

Who was responsible for passing the tax cut bill the Bush introduced? Well, who was controlling congress back in 2004? The tax cut bill that was passed then to benefit the oil companies is being offset by tax increases for other people. Someone has to make up the $77 billion.

As for your last question about the willingness of Congress, I think Congress may very well have been willing to do some of these things, but Bush likes to veto a LOT.

[bluefish81]

Got back from caucusing about an hour ago. The turnout at my caucus was huge - around 1,000 people! Plus, I got to meet the mayor of Omaha, because he was standing in line to register to caucus behind me so that was cool. There were so many people there they had to split us up because of fire code. So they divided us into a group in the gym and a group in the hallway. There were about 450 of us in the hallway - Obama won by about 100. I don't know how the gym vote turned out, they were still counting that when I left.

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by bluefish81

Got back from caucusing about an hour ago. The turnout at my caucus was huge - around 1,000 people! Plus, I got to meet the mayor of Omaha, because he was standing in line to register to caucus behind me so that was cool. There were so many people there they had to split us up because of fire code. So they divided us into a group in the gym and a group in the hallway. There were about 450 of us in the hallway - Obama won by about 100. I don't know how the gym vote turned out, they were still counting that when I left.

So your caucus is more like the Republican one in Iowa in which you vote rather than build the consensus?

This may have been covered before, and I apologize, but what actually separates a caucus from a primary when it's a one person with one vote kind of thing? And then, if anyone is feeling up to it, what makes a state convention to decide delegates different from a caucus?

[bluefish81]

Originally Posted by UGAalum94

So your caucus is more like the Republican one in Iowa in which you vote rather than build the consensus?

This may have been covered before, and I apologize, but what actually separates a caucus from a primary when it's a one person with one vote kind of thing? And then, if anyone is feeling up to it, what makes a state convention to decide delegates different from a caucus?

Not really, but it was a bit of a mess. Ideally it would have been run, very similar to the Iowa Democratic caucus, and it kind of was at my location - they just split us up because the fire marshall came to our location. I'm guessing because we were lucky enough to have not only the mayor but a State Senator in our caucus. From what I've read on the Omaha World-Herald's website, some of the other sites were done more like straw polls.

I admire the Nebraska Democratic party for saying, "Hey let's try this caucusing thing." Unfortunately, there were a few problems, the sites were WAY too small. And there weren't enough of them. Granted Nebraska is a very Republican heavy state, but to only have 15 caucus sites for all of Douglas County which is the largest county in the state is crazy. The county to the south of me, which picks up some southern suburbs and is the third largest county and they only had one caucus site for the whole county!

RE: your question on what seperates a caucus from a primary. I know that it was explained somewhere earlier (back when IA was doing it). Each state may have slight modifications though. I'll edit my link unless someone has already responded. I can say that states with caucuses still have state conventions. One of my co-workers is a state delegate for Huckabee in Iowa.

[AGDee]

Ok. I spent a long time reading Obama's site yesterday, every issue and his plan for everything. While I love where he hopes to go on most issues (we differ with a few things), I am concerned about how he plans to pay for all of it, because a lot of it would cost a whole lot of money. If he can really do it without harming the economy, then yay!

[UGAalum94]

Originally Posted by bluefish81

Who was responsible for passing the tax cut bill the Bush introduced? Well, who was controlling congress back in 2004? The tax cut bill that was passed then to benefit the oil companies is being offset by tax increases for other people. Someone has to make up the $77 billion.

As for your last question about the willingness of Congress, I think Congress may very well have been willing to do some of these things, but Bush likes to veto a LOT.

Well, if they were really interested in good government, they could muster up the override.

But I'm totally with you that the last Republican Congress was craptacular and not up to the task.