Posted on 08/09/2015 5:09:24 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
About 12 hours after the first prime-time GOP debate a message from a group called True Conservatives PAC showed up in my email with the title “you’re a useful idiot.” The beginning of the email is listed below.
It’s obvious Trump has struck a chord with people who are apoplectic at the GOP Establishment and for good reason. But people should stop to ask whether Trump is a conservative or if he’s using the crowded GOP field to promote himself. There’s also the entire “Trump is a Democrat plant” theory rolling around, which may or may not be true. But let’s take a look at some of the stances he took during the first prime-time debate.
Trump was asked by Bret Baier why he supported single-payer in 2000. Here’s his answer.
As far as single payer, it works in Canada. It works incredibly well in Scotland. It could have worked in a different age, which is the age you’re talking about here. What I’d like to see is a private system without the artificial lines around every state…Get rid of the artificial lines and you will have…— yourself great plans. And then we have to take care of the people that can’t take care of themselves. And I will do that through a different system.
Here’s the problem: the single-payer systems in Scotland and Canada aren’t working. The Fraser Institute did a study on wait times in Canada, which found people waited a LONG time to see a specialist after seeing a general practitioner (emphasis mine).
Waiting for treatment has become a defining characteristic of Canadian Healthcare…Specialist physicians surveyed report a median waiting time of 18.2 weeks between referral from a general practitioner and receipt of treatment. This wait time is 96% longer than in 1993 when it was just 9.3 weeks. There is a great deal of variation in the total waiting time faced by patients across the provinces. Ontario reports the shortest total wait (14.1 weeks), while New Brunswick reports the longest (37.3 weeks).
As far as Scotland is concerned, Avik Roy at Forbes writes why that single-payer system isn’t working “incredibly well,” especially for cancer patients.
If you’re diagnosed with breast cancer in the U.S., you have an 84 percent chance of living for five years. In Scotland, it’s 71 percent. If you have colon cancer in the U.S., you have about a 60 percent chance of surviving five years. In Scotland, it’s 46 percent. If you have prostate cancer in the U.S., you have a 92 percent chance of living five years; in Scotland, it’s 48 percent.
Sounds fantastic right? It’s true Trump talked about getting rid of state lines for insurance companies, which isn’t a bad idea. But he also talked about taking care of those who can’t afford it. This suggests a government-run system of some kind, whether it’s Medicaid or single-payer or Obamacare. The U.S. already has a single-payer system: it’s called the VA system. How’s THAT going? If Trump was a “conservative” he’d be more interested in letting people buy whatever insurance they wanted without a government mandate. Or trying to figure out how to get it back to doctors prescribing their own prices without worry about the insurance companies at all.
Trump also admitted to buying and selling politicians.
TRUMP: I will tell you that our system is broken. I gave to many people, before this, before two months ago, I was a businessman. I give to everybody. When they call, I give.
And do you know what? When I need something from them two years later, three years later, I call them, they are there for me.Baier: So what did you get?
TRUMP: And that’s a broken system.
Baier: What did you get from Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi?
TRUMP: Well, I’ll tell you what, with Hillary Clinton, I said be at my wedding and she came to my wedding. You know why? She didn’t have a choice because I gave. I gave to a foundation that, frankly, that foundation is supposed to do good. I didn’t know her money would be used on private jets going all over the world.
Note he didn’t say what he got from Nancy Pelosi. This is a fundamental problem. Trump can rail all he wants about the broken system (and it is broken). But talking about it and participating in it are two different things. And Trump is admitting to participating in it. Here’s the other thing about buying and selling politicians. It doesn’t have to involve political donations at all. Amity Shlaes wrote in her biography on Calvin Coolidge how people wanted to use their presidential connections to gain influence.
Even old friends could not resist exploiting the advantage of knowing a president. After he joined the Congregational Church in Washington, his family minister, Kenneth Welles, at the Edwards Church, could not conceal his glee at the power derived from being able to claim a president in the fold. In a letter to the president, Welles got specific on the power Coolidge’s step would give him to get support from the congregants: “It is going to give me a grip on some men like Gred Garrar and Judge Field which I never otherwise would have that.”
And that’s from a minister! Anyone remember the Ohio Gang involving Coolidge’s predecessor, Warren G. Harding? These were people who were friends of Harding who became political leaders. Trump has already talked about putting friends in charge of the VA system. Who’s to say he’s not going to do the same thing as Harding? Trump has used political connections to seize houses through eminent domain, including one from an elderly widow in Atlantic City. Since she wouldn’t sell, he used the New Jersey government to seize it. The government got tax dollars in return. Favor for favor.
Get past his rhetoric on illegal immigration. From a political standpoint, do we really want a president who thinks single-payer would have worked and admits to buying and selling politicians? Remember, Obama promised reform too, and then went out and rewarded his friends. Trump isn’t a conservative and to paint him as one is ridiculous. There’s a ton of anger out there and all Trump is doing is tapping into it by pretending to be a populist. But there’s a big difference between channeling anger into actually trying to solve the problem (and being very direct with it) and just giving in to rage. Trump is hoping people will just stay angry all the way to the White House (if he’s really serious about this run at all) so he can put in big government solutions and hand out favors. That’s not what a “true conservative” is. Those claiming otherwise just need to stop.
RE: Besides Cruz and Trump, the candidates all have the same donors, supporters, and friends.
What they say during the campaign has no bearing on how they will govern.
________________________
There is only one person who tries to consistently govern based on what he says and that is TED CRUZ.
Trump has switched opinions too many times to be trusted.
Trump’s opportunism is the great danger but it is also the great opportunity, to be redundant.
Will he understand what just buttered his political bread big time, and respect that.
I think that if he does not, it will be self punishing. The honeymoon of the candidacy is going on. The marriage will be rocky if he does not love the spouse.
"NOW" Trump is keeping Bush from leading in the polls and has gotten 10 million (or maybe twice that) to watch and listen to Cruz, Carson, etc. unfiltered in the debate.
People who wouldn't have otherwise done so.
Obviously what we should do NOW is make hay while this sun is shining.
Scotland has a life expectancy of 77 years and Canada 81 years. In the United States it’s 79.
Yeah, Canada has a terrible health care system.
Wouldn’t be a bad idea. I sure wouldn’t have the first idea how to do it.
A-frickin-men. Trump is Romney sewed up in a Godzilla suit. No coherent platform and a long record of liberal positions he now runs away from, all disguised by crash and bluster on the scale of a Toho Production.
Okay, then you’re not glad he urged to shut down the government to force defunding Planned Parenthood.
And I need go no farther. That’s the level of honesty here.
That’s schizophrenic behavior.
Others proposing this are revered and praised. Trump does it and you folks have a stroke.
Why even try to discuss something with you, when you’re that dishonest?
15 years ago he wrote a book called The America We Deserve. In it he wrote "The Republicans walk the NRA line and refuse even limited restrictions. I generally oppose gun control, but I support the ban on assault weapons and I also support a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun."
A ban on assault weapons in my opinion makes the intent of the 2nd amendment null and void. I could never vote for someone who holds or has held that position.
Obviously, you don’t know. Who speaks for conservatives on immigration? What is the litmus test for a “true conservative?
You seem to be focused on the abortion issue rather than all moral issues.
Congress must do everything it can to protect life from conception to natural death.
I believe in individual responsibility and accountability. Depending on Congress and the Courts to protect life from conception isn't working. Roe vs Wade has placed the State on the opposite side of the issue. Congress has failed to defund PP making us all complicit in this slaughter including infanticide. How does Trump or anyone else turn this around? We need to change the laws or disobey them. Conservatives are supposed to believe in the Rule of Law.
Religious liberty and family values must be preserved and protected from popular passions and mob rule.
Does that extend to the practice of Islam? Under Islam it is permissible to have multiple wives. Should Sharia law be allowed? Does religious liberty extend to the treatment of women under Islam? What do you mean by family values? How do you define a family?
The family is the core unit of a healthy and functioning society. It consists of a mother and father, each endowed by our Creator with unique and necessary characteristics to model to children, making them best capable of raising the next generation with the values and skills they will need to fully participate and contribute to our society. As well as preserve the cherished ideals required for American Exceptionalism to be passed on to future generations.
73% of blacks are born out of wedlock. The single parent household is becoming the rule rather than the exception. SCOTUS has made gay marriage the law of the land. How does Trump or a true conservative change that?
State Lawmakers must explicitly define marriage as the union between one man and one woman, a definition that predates our nation by thousands of years. This is the oldest institution in human history for a reason. Because how a culture procreates and passes on its legacy to the next generation is critical to its survival and well-being.
The States have been overruled by the courts and federal laws. Many states had constitutional amendments defining marriage as a union between one man and one woman. They have been overturned.
Regarding the right to life, it is the most basic human right. The Founding Fathers recognized this and declared all to be “created equal” and “endowed with certain unalienable rights.” Chief among the God-given rights each and every human being possesses is life.
Do true conservatives believe in the death penalty?
In 1973 the Supreme Court declared war on the unborn child when it invented a constitutional right to abortion services. Millions of lives have been cut off even before they are born and the dignity of the unborn child is still under attack. The left continues to push for unrestricted abortion; even going as far as trying to force employers to pay for birth control for their employees.
The reality is that abortion is the law of the land. It is legal up to the point of delivery. The US is only 1 of 7 countries in the world that allows abortion beyond 20 weeks. The six other nations that allow elective abortion after 20 weeks include China, North Korea, Singapore, Vietnam, Netherlands, and Canada. Singapore and the Netherlands prohibit abortion at 24 weeks and the United States prohibits abortion at the point of viability. The rest have no restrictions in law.
Congress can capitalize on this momentum by permanently prohibiting federal funds from being used to pay for abortion services.
Prohibiting federal funds for abortion is already the law of the land. However, money is fungible. The taxpayer supplies PP with half a billion a year for women's health services. The money is supposedly not used for abortion. No one believes that.
OK, I’ve articulated the Conservative Position on Moral Issues. If you are a Trump supporter, are you certain that Trump believes CONSISTENTLY in what I have articulated, or are there areas in which he disagrees?
I am not a Trump supporter nor do I believe he is a true conservative. He professes to now be pro-life.
As I indicated, your criteria raise more questions than they answer. We have politicians who spout these values but really don't act on them. A Rep controlled Congress can't even defund PP. They will not shut down the government despite the mass slaughter that is going on at PP. I have lost all respect for both parties. The undercover videos released so far should be the cause of a national outrage. The MSM, by and large, continues to ignore it like they did the Gosnell case. We have become morally bankrupt as a country. None of the Rep candidates will change any of it.
The national debt on January 3, 2000 was $5,751,743,092,605.50. It is now $18,151,322,549,156.91.
Since 2000 we have passed Prescription drugs as part of Medicare and added a $7.3 trillion unfunded liability and Obamacare, another massive entitlement program.
We have huge single payer medical programs now: Medicare with 47 million and Medicaid with 80 million on it. These programs will only grow as the baby boomers age. I know of no current sitting politician who proposes getting rid of Medicare or Medicaid. The GOP candidates all agree that they wish to preserve these programs.
Obama has explicitly said that Obamacare is just a transition to single payer for all medical care. The Reps in Congress had an opportunity to defund it and did not. They would rather pass symbolic bills and tell the uninformed voter that that will repeal Obamcare root and branch and replace it. Does it really matter what Trump says now about his plan 15 years ago or what it will be?
Ask two "true conservatives" and you'll get three different answers.
That’s the same Cruz that brags about not attacking the other candidates right? LMAO
Outside of Cruz, who is the perfect candidate these days?
Don't remember him bragging about that. By the way if you laughed your ass off there wouldn't be much of you left would there?
Actually, you’re the one that needs to read it.
If he’s a big fat lefty, why are all those groups against him?
It’s a whose who of the enemies of Conservatives.
They to a man are trying to destroy Trump.
Have you know them to vet Leftists out of our camp before?
Did they vet McCain out of our camp? How about Romney? Did they protect is from Dole?
Why do you folks think these Leftist are after Trump if he’s just like them?
Don’t bother explaining it to me. Explain it to yourself.
I know you are, but what am I?
Doesn’t fit, just the same age level.
I was reading all your posts along with the teenage LMAO and LOL stuff and figured that's where you were at. Sorry if I misjudged your age. Trump does like them young.
LOL
You think you really scored there right?
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