yes, i was up between 3-5AM to watch the debates live. cuz, u know, its just not the same to watch the recording on cnn or youtube or wherever, cuz then you're not among the first to hear/see the action. it aint so fresh n clean no more. so i made sure to get it fresh from the source at the time of production, or something like that.
-- in my post below, i ripped a bit on mccain's health care plans, cuz i dont think it should be deregulated or privatized. to be fair, though, i do believe that health care has become a huge overhead cost for businesses and the ones that suffer the most are usually small to medium sized businesses. so something has to be done to reform this. something other than privatization. this brings me to my criticism of b-obama's healthcare plan as well. this criticism is actually about his tax plan, but over the past few weeks, b-obama has been trying to link his tax plan directly to healthcare, so i will endulge. b-obama wants to provide a tax cut for something like 95% of americans, he says, people making under $200,000. thats great. now, the problem lies in the fact that he also wants to use a similar threshold for small businesses. he claimed in the debate that this will only affect a "few" businesses as most small businesses make under $250,000 in revenue. as a firm believer that small and medium size businesses are the buffer and core of economies i disagree strongly with this. i hope someone smart tells b-obama that there are quite a bit more than a few businesses considered small to medium sized that make more than $250,000/yr in revenue. businesses with revenues of $2mil, $3mil, even upwards of $25mil are often considered small to medium sized. any economy needs to encourage these businesses and not stymy them with taxes. the healthcare part in this comes in the fact that more and more of these businesses are going under because of the evergrowing, sky-rocketing costs of healthcare. taxing individuals that make a certain amount is fine. taxing businesses that are at the core of economic growth at the same level as individuals, i dont think is wise. not knowing too much about the tax code or even healthcare, i would suggest that there be a tax code with threshholds for indiduals which is distinct from the thresholds for businesses. it only makes sense. at least in my head.
-- another problem i had with b-obama is he was given a golden opportunity to live up to his rhetoric as i mentioned in the post below: "to tell americans the hard truth, what they need to hear, and not just what they want to hear." The moderator asked both candidates if they are ready to admit to the public that things will get muh worse before they get better. americans aren't stupid. well at least most of them. or maybe just some of them. but regardless, smart people know that the economic "down-turn" in the US has not yet reached rock bottom and it's bound to go down before it rebounds. neither was man enough to say that, but simply begged the question with some lame response of something like we can skip the worst of it and the good ole days are not too far out in the future.
-- I enjoyed mccain pointing to b-obama and proclaiming him as "that one". bring a bit of debating back to debates. US debates in the last several cycles have seriously watered down the idea of debating. i enjoyed when b-obama used the age-old trick of using the opponents words against him ("...Well, you know, Sen. McCain, in the last debate and today, again, suggested that I don't understand. It's true. There are some things I don't understand.I don't understand how we ended up invading a country that had nothing to do with 9/11, while Osama Bin Laden and Al Qaeda are setting up base camps and safe havens to train terrorists to attack us.That was Sen. McCain's judgment and it was the wrong judgment.When Sen. McCain was cheerleading the president to go into Iraq, he suggested it was going to be quick and easy, we'd be greeted as liberators.That was the wrong judgment, and it's been costly to us..."). simply brilliant. thats debating.
-- finally, moving away from the US a bit, there are now rumors (pretty substantial ones) of a breakaway party forming in SA to provide an alternative to the ANC. I sincerely hope it gathers strength and is formed on a basis of more than just anger and greed. cuz it'd be nice to talk about meaningful debate in the run-up to SA elections, rather than this "the prez is already decided 2 yrs in advance" business...
chin chin.
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