In my 50+ years, the GOP hasn't ONE positive contribution to humanity

[tenderfoot]

So spare us the posts about how fabulous free market capitalism is and if it weren't for moderates... You've got nothing. Who's rights did the right ever go to bat for? Billionaires and bigots?

Fuck off already.

[Fresh_Start]

1. there are few enough but its dishonest to say none

Nixon and the EPA and National Cancer Act

BTW: Nixon attempted a guaranteed income for families with children and attempted something like Obamacare...but the democrats didn't view either as progressive enough. The perfect is the enemy of the good.

I deliberately choose to look at Nixon because I'm sure most of us would naturally assume he was the worst president in the last 50 years.

[tenderfoot]

5. But Ronald Reagan nullified all that

So any good was cancelled out. Bringing them back to ZERO!

[Fresh_Start]

14. actually the democrats nullified guaranteed income and national healthcare

and the EPA is still around although I will admit it has been constrainted

so, you are still incorrect in your original assertion

[tenderfoot]

16. No. You're incorrect

http://www.ontheissues.org/Celeb/Ronald_Reagan_Environment.htm

Nice try though

[tabasco]

17. Oh FFS. Nixon had no choice with regard to the EPA

Democratic Congress had enough support to override a veto, so Nixon played smart politics and acted like it was a great idea. I get very tired of reading "Nixon created the EPA." It displays a remarkable ignorance of how the EPA came to be.

[mrr303am]

39. Nixon also started OSHA and the healthcare you refer too was to require all employers to provide

health insurance to their employees, and Ted Kennedy led the opposition to it because it wasn't proposed by democrats.

[Rex]

44. Fine. The GOP has done nothing productive in 35+ years.

[Nye Bevan]

2. The ADA?

https://www.eeoc.gov/eeoc/history/35th/videos/ada_signing_text.html

Medicare prescription drug coverage?

[catrose]

33. But with the donut hole?

If you can't afford to pay for your own drugs during the gap, you spend a good part of the year without medication. Not very grateful for that.

[Hayduke Bomgarte]

3. I'm right there with ya.

I'm 52 and in my life time the goops have not done one damn positive thing for the average citizen. And according to my understanding of history, the last thug that did do something that benefited Joe Sixpack, was Eisenhower, when he got the Interstate highway system rolling.

Even that was not to primarily improve our lives. Nope. That was a happy, accidental by-product. In the midst of the Cold War, the interstates were purely a military move. Fear of the red menace invading us, anywhere within the borders is what prompted the Highway system. Even now Interstates are required to be built with at least one mile out of every ten being straight and with no obstructions, such as overpasses, to accommodate the landing of troop transports and supply planes.

That travel and goods tranports would also benefit was, as I said, a happy by-product.

You're quite right. Rethugs are useless and are not fit to hold elected office at any level, and have not been fit in decades. Longer than our lives, Bro.

[jmowreader]

7. Oh god. Quit believing that "one mile out of ten" crap

It's not true. It's never BEEN true.

http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/publications/publicroads/00mayjun/onemileinfive.cfm

[Hayduke Bomgarte]

13. OK, I'll buy that

Last edited Sat May 21, 2016, 05:27 PM - Edit history (2)

I read your linked article.

Being a dump/cement truck driver I've hauled countless tons of asphalt/concrete over the years to highway extensions and repavings over the years. I was taking the word of what various project managers and engineers have said numerous times, during job orientation classes for instance, as gospel.

That said then, that means even Ike didn't really do anything for the average Joe, which raises my revulsion of thugs even more.

*ETA*

DOH! What a bonehead. I came at it all wrong with the new info. Dismissing any military aspect from the interstates, as I'm now forced to do, actually leaves no other reasonable conclusion, other than Ike did do it for the public good.
I still despise repugs though.

[Jim Lane]

63. You're not a complete bonehead.

You write, "Dismissing any military aspect from the interstates, as I'm now forced to do, actually leaves no other reasonable conclusion, other than Ike did do it for the public good." You don't need to back off that far.

One certainly should not dismiss ANY military aspect from the interstates -- officially known as the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways (emphasis added). From the Wikipedia article:

The Interstate Highway System gained a champion in President Dwight D. Eisenhower, who was influenced by his experiences as a young Army officer crossing the country in the 1919 Army Convoy on the Lincoln Highway, the first road across America. Eisenhower gained an appreciation of the Reichsautobahn system, the first "national" implementation of modern Germany's Autobahn network, as a necessary component of a national defense system while he was serving as Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe during World War II.[15] He recognized that the proposed system would also provide key ground transport routes for military supplies and troop deployments in case of an emergency or foreign invasion.

[scscholar]

4. Medicare Part D

The only good thing from the Shrub.

[awoke_in_2003]

28. Except for the fact...

that it made it impossible for Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices.

[catrose]

34. That and the donut hole

[Hoyt]

51. Not to defend george war bush, but the Part D insurers can and do negotiate drug prices. It is the

government that can't negotiate. I don't like that either, but Part D insurers do negotiate and refuse to accept some drugs that are too costly compared to other meds available.

[awoke_in_2003]

52. Thank you for the info...

when you say "part D insurers" does that mean the supplemental providers?

[Hoyt]

53. When you opt for Part D, you are buying it from a private, usually for-profit, insurance company.

Sometimes Part D is coupled with Part C, the Medicare Advantage Plans that some 30+% of Medicare beneficiaries purchase because they get some things Medicare doesn't provide. I think most folks go go Advantage Plans because you get limits on your out-of-pocket costs that traditional Medicare does not provide (technically, there's a limit because when you go broke, you might qualify for Medicaid).

[awoke_in_2003]

54. Thanks. nt

[LiberalArkie]

30. Well not really. It would have been great if the Republicans would have allowed Medicare to

negotiate the price of drugs. My part d coverage costs me $47 a month. By drugs without insurance cost me $37 a month. Now I pay only $17 a month with the insurance. Maybe one day I will get sick enough to have the insurance to pay more. I have a neighbor that flies to Canada every 3 month for his drugs that would cost over $1000 a month with part D.

I am sure it helps a lot of people, but it helps the Pharma companies a lot more.

[hopemountain]

71. obviously you do not have a chronic condition

requiring medications. what your evil shrub did is privatized part d coverage in favor of the pharmaceutical and insurance industry. aarp participated in grabbing their share of the pie, too.

so, no. i have no gratitude to your shrub.

[NobodyHere]

6. Do not call list?

[tenderfoot]

8. But you have to keep calling to stop the calls

eom

[AirmensMom]

35. Doesn't work.

We were on it from day one and still got calls. Finally ditched the land line...sort of drastic just to get the calls to stop. And, yes, I reported them. Heather from Card Services keeps changing the number.

[egduj]

9. Adam Walsh child safety and protection act.

[tenderfoot]

12. So heart warming when conservatives pretend that they care about children

Makes up for all the cuts to education and nutritional programs.

[Octafish]

70. Rep Mark Foley R-FL child molester headed caucus on missing and exploited children.

Carried water for Sweaty Denny Hestert and all manner of GOP crapola, too.

[Hortensis]

10. Back to Nixon for normalizing relations with China.

SOME Republicans for voting to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Plenty else.

Tenderfoot, your statement as it stands is far too rigid and absolutist to be anything but just plain wrong. There is a world of difference between the various conservative personality types, degrees, and factions. And how they behave in different eras.

[tenderfoot]

11. Not one decent contribution to mankind

You grasp at straws to your hearts desire but there's no there there. Give up the gig.

[Hortensis]

42. Sorry, but bigotry is bigotry. No group is all bad,

not blacks, not liberals, not Catholics or Muslims, not conservatives.

I certainly understand and share your disgust with what they've been doing as groups. Experts have been manipulating them by taking advantage of their weaknesses and, generally speaking, turning them into the worst versions of themselves progressively for over 30 years now.

[Bluenorthwest]

18. The OP speaks of the GOP, not of the few that defied that body to vote for Civil Rights

The Republican Party has not done anything, not promoted any initiative that was favorable to the people. Sure, that one voted with the Democrats that one time and that was great. But the Republican Party? All toxins. All the time.

[awoke_in_2003]

29. That worked out real well

for American industry. Normalizing relations with China was the first nail in the middle class coffin.

[rockfordfile]

67. Not really

[pintobean]

15. Always so bright and cheery.

You've been very consistent over the years.

[tenderfoot]

19. Consistently correct too

how do you like those apples bully?

[pintobean]

20. Lol. Yeah, right.

And, you shouldn't be calling people bullies.

[tenderfoot]

21. Says the bully

Bully.

[pintobean]

22. I've never had to change my name.

[tenderfoot]

23. I changed because I was bored of the other one

Get a clue.

[pintobean]

25. Uh-huh.

[tenderfoot]

26. Yep. Just a typical misogynist bully.

Bully.

[Kingofalldems]

32. Apparently he has the power to know what you are thinking.

[pintobean]

36. The power of observation.

[HOPNOSH]

56. Your powers of observation are still your opinion. Not an absolute

Why are you being so pedantic and dogmatic at the same time? Silly chest puffing.

[pintobean]

57. Welcome to DU!

[CreekDog]

62. Only if you want to be liked

[pintobean]

65. Bingo!

[Skittles]

60. that's why I am a huge fan

yes INDEED

[CreekDog]

61. Speaking of bright, how many times did you whine about new lightbulb technology?

Or were you bright and cheery about that?

[tenderfoot]

24. So glad to anger the sites wingnuts

Poor babies

[Rex]

46. +1

[Hydra]

27. This shouldn't even be a question

But with the hard lurch to the right our party is taking to become the new GOP, I guess it's not a surprise that we're being told these are our new "values."

Sorry...no born yesterday, and even if I was I'm guessing I'd still see through it.

[MoreGOPoop]

38. That right there!

It must be the Prosperity Gospel.

[ReRe]

49. Bingo...

... nothing means nothing unless there's something to be gained. If there's nothing to be gained financially, then the GOP is outta' there. The bottom line is king, no matter if it hurts or harms someone or something of value. It's how they gauge everything in life.

[tom_kelly]

37. +1 - yesir! n/t

[TrappedInUtah]

43. Short answer: No

The GOP hasn't stood for ordinary citizens, the environment or social justice in the last 50+ years.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

45. If you go back 60 they helped LBJ pass his landmark civil rights legislation

That was before the parties began to switch roles.

[Turin_C3PO]

66. I wouldn't say the parties switched roles.

The Democrats though have been more progressive on almost everything since at least the 20's, the Dixiecrats an important exception. But the Repubs have long been for the privileged few and anti-labor. Neither party was great on civil rights until the 60's, really.

[ErikJ]

68. I think that may have been part of Nixon's Southern Strategy

He probably convinced enough Republicans to vote for it so it would pass, knowing the blame for the bill would be on Democrat LBJ forever. This was then used to get votes of the Southern racists for him in 1968 and to switch parties.

[DemocratSinceBirth]

69. There were some who supported it because it was the right thing to do.

There were some who supported it because it affected the south and not them.

Did you see the HBO movie on LBJ? It was awesome. The man was a walking contradiction.

[cali]

47. Actually and factually, you are wrong.

Just off the top of my head, the EPA. However, the ffs damage the republicans have inflicted far outweighs the good.

[SylviaD]

48. What about...

Nixon reached out to China?

Made the final decision to bring the troops home?

George W Bush Emergency AIDS funding (Bono)?

Um....?

Reagan/Gorbachev summit?

[ReRe]

50. Seriously

K&R

... the last three words.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

55. you answered your own question

[Angel Martin]

58. it was entirely unintentional,

but one of the very few good consequences that came out of getting rid of Saddam was that Gaddafi got scared he would be next, and he disclosed and turned over his nuclear program.

So at least that stuff isn't there now for ISIS and al Qaeda.


... fools, drunks and the United States of America.

[Jim Lane]

64. I guess you aren't counting the contributions to cartoonists and late-night comedians. (n/t)

[HereSince1628]

72. 50 years ago is enough to capture the Environmental Protection Agency

and the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts.

Nixon's appointment of Ruckelshaus to be first Dir of the EPA was a surprisingly good choice.

[tenderfoot]

73. So sad that Ronald Reagan cancelled all that out ....

as was pointed out earlier in the thread.

[HereSince1628]

74. that's sort of the problem with sizeable ignore lists... I miss 2/3s of the threads now

I hope to have the DU habit broken by the CA primary... I suppose awareness of the dysfunction helps