Humor me

Gatling

OK was to ask this the other night but Washington went into lockdown ,
With the current ongoing shutdown over the affordable health care bill ( stupid why its referred to Obamacare)
And the republican stance of no,no ,no to every thing for what seems the last 12-18 months of the political calendar in the US ,
Would people who would actually benefit the most from being able to purchase affordable health care took up arms under the 2A in defence of a tyrannical government who refues to even acknowledge there right to affordable healthcare and so on ,and vice versa could militias who side with the republican and tea party and support the idea the affordable health care and other benefits shouldn't be for everyone ,take up arms against the current elected government ,
I know the above may read and sound stupid ,

buts an honest question

InTheTrees

Civil War? No. We thought the same thing when george bush stole the election from Al gore. And after the "patriot" act. But it would never happen.

Americans generally dont even protest on the street. There were some marches before the war, and the WTO in seattle but its exceptionally rare.

InTheTrees

It was called "ObamaCare" by republicans who intended it to be derogatory. But as usual they're so out of touch that the name has become a positive.

nagilum2

Ye thought that way because most ppl in Ireland just hate the US right.

But here in the US, The most amazing thing about this whole shutdown that most people just don't care. This is nearly an expected outcome for what has become a wretched political state of affairs in the US. Ppl aren't happy about it, but there are no mass protests or anything, and there won't be. Trust has been lost. The average American on the street thinks very poorly of just about all of the politicians right now.

So you're left with a situation where the only people who are raising a fuss about how terrible the other side is are the people who would never in a million years vote for the other side anyway.

And because of gerrymandering, the parties have created a modern political reality in which the most elected reps are in totally safe districts and never have to worry about anyone except those people who would never vote for the other side. In these safe districts, they only have to win the primary, and the ppl who vote in primaries are always the most extreme - they'd vote a straight ticket even if their candidate was a known murderer, such is their hate for the other side. They'd rationalize it somehow.

So why compromise? You'll only get punished by your base - and because of gerrymandering, you only care about the most polarized of your base anyway in most districts.

Free from the inconvenient shackles of having to actually care about what's good for the country, both parties created and benefited from a campaign finance system where their cronies can give them lots of de facto bribes - campaign $$ in exchange for political weight on a pet topic. And if for some reason they do lose, they can pick up a multimillion dollar job lobbying the new congressman on behalf of the a crony that used to pay them. And the band marches on...

Black Swan

MOD COMMENT:
There are already 2 threads running on the consequences/potential consequences/"what if," etc., etc. of the shutdown, as well as associated Obamacare discussions (both of which sometimes cross-over between the 2 threads). I would merge this thread with one of those, but when doing that, some out-of-sequence posting may occur, which may add to confusion.