Bard

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The study assumes, and I am not kidding one iota, that reducing all provider and hospital income to Medicare reimbursement rates will not cause any disruption in the supply of health care.

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Healthcare is subject to the Law of Supply & Demand just like anything else. Stymie supply, Price goes up.

Medicare and health insurance already stimulate Demand while Supply has been suffering (thanks to AMA decisions and the ACA). Artificially limiting Price is going to do nothing but further limit Supply (early retirements, changing professions, etc).

Whoever wrote this needs to be beaten with Sowell's Basic Economics until they can recite the Law of Supply & Demand in their sleep.

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The examples of socialism's failure do not overcome the power of Envy. It's one of the 7 deadly sins from the beginning of time and it's strong in the Dem party.

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Bingo. Socialism is just a $10 word for envy. It's the philosophy of believing others have "too much" (which is an arbitrary and subjective concept), thus it should be taken from them and given to others who do not have "as much" (another arbitrary and subjective concept). This is done to make themselves feel morally superior via knighting for the "noble victim," benefit themselves or both.

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This should be the movie/tv boards tagline now. I'm going to hate on it and tell the people that have watched it all about the show and it's messaging before I even watch it. Pretty much what this board is now.

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Go back and re-read what I wrote, slowly if you have to, then come back and explain to me how my post was hating on the show.

Start working part-time as an officer then patrol your neighborhood? :dunno:

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I think he is worried

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He should be. Inflation has remained above 3% for most of this year thus far. Inflation is a function of too much money in the economy and Congress is on track to spend $2.1T in deficit this year.

Fun fact: that's the 3rd highest deficit in history, following 2021's $2.77T and 2020's $3.13T.

Fun fact #2: All five of the five largest deficits in US history have happened since 2020.

In order to cut spending just to balance the budget (ie: not pay the debt down one cent) while still servicing the debt, it would mean cutting every penny the federal government spent this year by ~35% (without debt servicing it would be ~29%, but not servicing would be suicide). Cutting that much would create a deep recession or even depression. The resulting popping of the consumer credit bubble would absolutely put us into a deep depression. With the vast majority of the citizenry being far removed from agrarianism, it would likely make the Great Depression look like a church picnic (and no, that's not hyperbole).

As long as deficits remain higher than giraffe pussy, inflation is going to continue to remain sticky well above the 2% target. As long as it remains sticky, the Fed is going to feel pressured to raise rates. As long as there is a probability of the Fed raising rates, yields are going to stay high. Along with that, as long as deficit spending continues apace, there's going to be less desire to buy US debt without an increase in auction tails which will translate to an eventual growth in yields.

In other words, it's a no-win situation and Jerry's mythological "soft landing" remains just that: mythological.

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Once again, the 3rd option is the 1st amendment.

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It doesn't matter what the religion is, the 1st amendment protects against it, and it also protects it.

Our entire country was founded with the goal of fighting it. The solution already exists.

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And, once again, show me where existing laws have stopped Muslims from gaining enough power to eventually change them because I can show you examples of where existing laws did not.

-When Pakistan gained independence in 1947, non-Muslims (mainly Hindus and Christians, but there were others) made up roughly 20-25% of the population. The country initially operated with more secular or tolerant features in practice as the country's founder (Muhammad Ali Jinnah) pushed his early vision of a pluralistic state protecting minorities. Over time, as the Muslim majority consolidated and political Islam grew, this changed.

The 1956 constitution declared it an Islamic Republic and then the 1973 constitution made Islam the state religion. In 1974, under elected Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, parliament amended the constitution to declare Ahmadis non-Muslims. Under General Zia-ul-Haq (1970s-1980s), Hudood Ordinances, strengthened blasphemy laws, and other Islamization measures sharply curtailed freedoms. Blasphemy cases exploded (from a handful pre-1980s to thousands later). Completely contrary to the vision of the country's founder, this disproportionately targeted minorities. Following it, the minorities’ share of the population fell to about 3-4%. Religious freedom for non-Muslims and was substantially lessened through both law and social enforcement despite their laws because those laws were changed.

-The 1979 Islamic Revolution brought hardline Islamist forces to power in a country which was already Muslim-majority but had religious freedoms for non-Muslims. The new Islamic Republic constitution and legal system subordinated religious freedom to Sharia interpretations. Things like apostasy became punishable, conversion from Islam was heavily regulated, and non-Muslims faced legal inequalities in testimony, inheritance, and public life. This was a clear post-power-shift reduction in the freedoms that had existed under the prior legal order.

-In Indonesia the state ideology of Pancasila formally supported belief in one God and religious pluralism. After the fall of Suharto in 1998, democratic politics rose and the Muslims there rode that into strong enough political power to start influencing laws, like blasphemy provisions being expanded/enforced more aggressively against non-Muslims, discriminatory local regulations against non-Muslims being allowed to be proliferated, and groups such as Ahmadis and some Christians were given greater restrictions while an increasingly blind eye was turned toward violence committed against them.

-While the Malaysian constitution still technically permits other religions to be practiced “in peace and harmony,” it also made Islam the religion of the Federation (1957). Over decades, as Malay-Muslim political power and Islamist parties (like PAS, for instance) gained influence, restrictions increased on non-Muslims (against non-Muslim proselytism and places of worship, for example) and on Muslims regarding apostasy or deviation from official Sunni orthodoxy.

-In Lebanon, the confessional constitution (essentially, government split down the middle between Christians and Muslims) and National Pact provided structured religious representation and freedoms in a society which was more balanced between Christians and Muslims. Demographic shifts toward a Muslim majority, a civil war and the 1989 Taif Agreement had the cumulative effect of adjusted power-sharing by reducing relative Christian political weight. Formal freedoms largely remain for now, but practical influence and security for some Christian communities have declined amid broader (and increasing) Islamist and sectarian pressures (see: Hezbollah, for example).


So these are real-world events which have lessened, removed, repealed or just ignored laws set up to protect religious freedoms in countries as Islamic influence increased. It's a pattern and it's why I say, repeatedly, Islam isn't allowing your 3rd option.

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But based on this paragraph I can see why you want to get rid of the 1st amendment. You just want to impose your religion on people.

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I've never mentioned another religion taking over because no other religion is trying to not only take over, but to eventually push out all other religions like Islam has been and is currently doing. I'm showing you that your theoretical third option doesn't work in reality and it agitates you so much you've now created a strawman to rage and argue against.

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frick off.

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The depth of depression this economy would undergo from paying off the debt would be almost as bad as the debt bubble bursting

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Both are dominos, it's just a matter of which one will fall first to knock the other down.

Calm down, Eric.

The separatists in Alberta needed 177,732 votes to get their initiative on the ballot for October 19, what they got was 222,521 votes. While they got quite a bit more than they needed, it's far from a done deal yet.

The question they will now have included on the October 19 ballot is:

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Should Alberta remain a province of Canada or should the Government of Alberta commence the legal process required under the Canadian Constitution to hold a binding provincial referendum on whether or not Alberta should separate from Canada?

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If the majority vote "YES," all that does is authorize the Alberta government to begin the constitutional process for a subsequent binding referendum on independence.

However, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled in the Quebec Secession Reference (1998) that a province has no unilateral right to secede. Even a referendum victory would not -by itself- allow Alberta to secede.

This is where Canada's Clarity Act becomes important.

The federal House of Commons gets to determine whether the referendum question is sufficiently clear. It cannot simply be a question that combines independence with some other proposal or ambiguous alternative.

But let's say the House of Commons agrees the question was straight-forward, at that point it then returns to Alberta to vote again. This would be the real secession referendum., but understand that a simple vote of 51% would not automatically be enough.

The Supreme Court has also said there must be a “clear majority” expressing a “clear” desire to secede. The Clarity Act subsequently gave the House of Commons the responsibility for determining whether the result constitutes a clear expression of the will of a clear majority (meaning it can consider the size of the majority, turnout, and other circumstances).

Now let's say that there was a clear majority and a clear desire... well, that's STILL NOT the secession. The Supreme Court's ruling also says a clear democratic mandate would create a constitutional obligation for the federal government to begin good faith negotiations. That's a lot more simple than it sounds because it would include things like the borders, federal debt and assets, federal government buildings and property in Alberta, Canadian Armed Forces installations and equipment, pensions for federal employees, what happens with federal employees living in Alberta, citizenship and immigration, currency and monetary policy, trade between Alberta and Canada, access to ports and transportation infrastructure, oil and gas infrastructure and pipelines, water rights, social programs, international treaties, rights of Albertans living elsewhere in Canada and Canadians living in Alberta, etc.

As if all that wasn't enough, there are also a plethora of issues concerning indigenous and treaty rights as well as First Nations' lands and territories. This could be especially consequential in Alberta because First Nations treaties cover essentially the entire province.

And once all of this was accomplished, there would be one final legal hurdle: there is no constitutional mechanism by which a province can simply repeal its membership in Canada. Their Constitution would have to be amended to remove Alberta from the Canadian federation and establish the new constitutional relationship.

And the cherry on top of this is that there is (at least at this point) no legal timeframe within which any of these points would need to be completed, much less the whole thing.

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Ahsoka

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