But understand where the spitting stories originated (from the rabid, right-wing) and that to date first hand accounts of NAMED soldiers who experienced it do not exist.

I have seen multiple sites with many names. Who is the ultimate authority that is claiming this didn’t happen?

Oh, here is another link for another site…please scroll the comments.

a. hillary
b. mccain

america first!

what does he know about Obama? what does that tell us about what he THINKS about Obama?

hilarious…

a. hillary
b. mccain

america first!

Here’s a detailed example. I was working for MediCare at the time they started the prescription drug benefit. What very few people realize(d) was that in funding this MediCare “benefit,” they took most of the money from MedicAid. MedicAid was run at the state level, with subsidies from the Federal government. I worked as a telephone advisor to people who called MediCare to find out how they could replace the medications they lost when MedicAid lost its funding base. MedicAid is for the poor, many of whom are handicapped or elderly.

I had to quit the job after two months because it was making me, a big grown man, want to cry nearly every day. I took so many calls, day after day, from people who had just been dropped or sharply curtailed from MedicAid, and were being fed BS from the government that this new MediCare benefit was better for everyone. All they gained from the MediCare program was a bunch of “plans” offered by collusion, or partnerships, of drug manufacturers, insurance companies, and drug store chains.

Now to address your question more directly, when left to the individual states, the states with a high tax base can afford to provide better MedicAid benefits than tax-poor states. So one result was a flood of calls from states like Mississippi, with callers actually weeping because they were elderly or handicapped, and had been on MedicAid to receive their medications, but now all they had were discount plans that only saved them an average of 15% off retail. And then, of course, the drug companies just started raising prices to offset the discounts.

These people had necessary medications that were prescribed to them, but no help from the government to help pay for them. The money that had paid for them under MedicAid came from the Federal government subsidies to the states, and when the states lost that subsidy, they were on their own to take care of their elderly and infirm. The depth of the deprivation to these people varied from state to state.

That’s one example of why some of us prefer that our Federal taxes go to where they help people regardless of what state they live in. This is the United States, not a bunch of competing nations.

Given that the Republicans have been in charge of the Congress for 12 of the last 14 years and in charge of the White House for all but 12 of the last 40 YEARS your might want to ask the Republicans about the ever growing government. For the party of small government they sure have a taste for big spending.

Not as far as I’m concerned, it is not an option. I want my vote to count and what I want it to count as in this election is a vote against the fraud within the DNC. Sure, I can vote third party, abstain, write in Senator Clinton in protest. Guess what, no one will care, no party is going to take notice and make changes. However, if McCain wins the White House when everything points that a Republican shouldn’t be able to win this election even if there isn’t an opponent, both parties will take notice.

My state swung towards Kerry in the last election by 85k. My vote will count this November. I’m not going to give it to a third party, I’m going to do my best to swing the state Republican. I don’t think in this election I have the luxury of a protest vote. If Senator Obama wins the electoral votes in my state but only does so by 5k, both parties will notice. You’re right, they’ll notice if the defecting Democrats vote third party, but they won’t give it as much significance as that 80k voting Republican will. They know they’ll probably pull those third party votes back in the next election, but they can’t be as sure when Democrats go Republican or Republicans go Democrat.

There’s no such thing as a stupid question. The answer is no, to all of the above. And to be an Obama supporter, one did not have to:

1. call Hillary ‘really a Republican’
2. call the Clintons racist
3. ignore the lessons of ‘Animal Farm’
4. believe John Edwards’ bullshit apology for his Iraq War Vote
5. ignore John Edwards’ two-faced war-mongering at the Israeli Security Conference
6. attack Hillary like she was Karl Rove
7. make excuses for Obama’s flip-flop on FISA, etc.
8. make fun of McCain’s suffering as a POW, the reason he opposes torture
9. pretend Kerry never asked McCain to be his V.P., and Kennedy never asked McCain to switch parties, and McCain never bucked the ultra-right on immigration, and McCain never worked with Russ Feingold on campaign finance reform
10. try to scare Americans that we might end up with a woman President if McCain is elected.