Politics Democrats have owned this state for decades - what do we have to show for it?

[barfo]

Last night.

Nope. Kind of a sore loser, also. Bye bye Knute.

barfo

 

[e_blazer]

When was the last time there was one who deserved to be?

barfo

I bet you wear blue underwear.

 

[MARIS61]

Again, Kate Brown funded my son's healthcare.

Kate Brown didn't fund anything.

Hard-working Oregon citizens paid for your son's healthcare, and the least you could do is thank them for it.

 

[barfo]

I bet you wear blue underwear.

I don't even wear pants.

barfo

 

[Natebishop3]

So republicans have put forward a plan... Yeah.. no...

We don't want their policies.

You have to see how this is confusing.

And the whole point of this thread is to talk about how the Dems have been in charge for decades. What have they done right? You can't blame Republicans for anything here. They haven't been in charge for my entire life.

 

[BrianFromWA]

We don't want their policies. The people said that last night. Everything I voted for won.

Partially because you're in a place where a lot of people vote like you. And like Nate says, what do you have to show for it, besides taking money from my pocket and giving it to an insurance company to pay for a doctor overcharging you for your son's treatment? I know you don't care, which is your right, but the irony of you railing about any kind of tax relief to the middle class while trumpeting that allowing docs and hospitals to charge whatever they want and get paid, by-and-large, for it from tax revenue or debt that's piling up for our kids, is rich.

Everything I voted for won.

Almost samesies, except that I don't think felons should get to vote again unless state gives them clemency. I also don't think they should have weapons, which the Supreme Court agreed with me on. But hey...if the worst that happened was that 1.5M felons get to vote their conscience in 2 years, it was a good night for me. Tampa, at this point, is at least a few more years removed from becoming socialist.

 

[barfo]

You have to see how this is confusing.

And the whole point of this thread is to talk about how the Dems have been in charge for decades. What have they done right? You can't blame Republicans for anything here. They haven't been in charge for my entire life.

I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience.

barfo

 

[e_blazer]

I don't even wear pants.

barfo

Damn, there's a mental picture I didn't need. I'm guessing your ass is painted blue then.

 

[Boob-No-More]

I knew I could count on BNM to come in here and provide something more interesting than legalized weed, higher minimum wage and mass transit.

Yes, but it will generate zero discussion because it's not one of the standard polarizing political hot buttons. Mention building a wall and/or a "caravan" heading toward our southern boarder and both sides are up in arms and posting their usual rhetoric. Mention something that has actually happened in our state that has dramatically transformed our economy from one heavily reliant on extraction industries to one based on modern technology and no one cares. If there are no canned sound bites or memes you get crickets.

I blame Twitter and the rapidly shrinking attention span of the average American (on both sides of the political fence).

BNM

 

[Lanny]

Nonsense, they've promised to do that for over 30 years, never even put a plausible plan up for vote.

Freaked out when Trump started talking about it.

Not exactly, Trump talked about a private enterprise thing. I guess that means private toll roads and private toll bridges. With a Republican majority in both Houses and a Republican President, how come nothing got done? Zilch, zero, the null set, not a thing. Instead, all he talks about is a useless and very expensive Wall, but what am I worried about 'cause he's promised that Mexico will pay for it and be glad they did. A promise made, a promise kept.

 

[dviss1]

Almost samesies, except that I don't think felons should get to vote again unless state gives them clemency. I also don't think they should have weapons, which the Supreme Court agreed with me on. But hey...if the worst that happened was that 1.5M felons get to vote their conscience in 2 years, it was a good night for me. Tampa, at this point, is at least a few more years removed from becoming socialist.

All felons should get to vote. I believe they should get to vote while incarcerated. We definitely disagree there.

Not sure why y'all don't remember the republicans that used to run our state.

 

[dviss1]

Yes, but it will generate zero discussion because it's not one of the standard polarizing political hot buttons. Mention building a wall and/or a "caravan" heading toward our southern boarder and both sides are up in arms and posting their usual rhetoric. Mention something that has actually happened in our state that has dramatically transformed our economy from one heavily reliant on extraction industries to one based on modern technology and no one cares. If there are no canned sound bites or memes you get crickets.

I blame Twitter and the rapidly shrinking attention span of the average American (on both sides of the political fence).

BNM

You didn't know about the multiple Chupacabras in the army approaching our border?!?!?!

 

[dviss1]

I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth and inexperience.

barfo

 

[Boob-No-More]

You didn't know about the multiple Chupacabras in the army approaching our border?!?!?!

So now it's an army? So hard to keep up. I was told it was a Caravan:

BNM

 

[andalusian]

I would argue for a better roadway system.

Example - the Sunset Highway tunnel that goes into Portland. It's a total joke and should have been replaced decades ago.

I agree with this and I believe I even said it on this very site right before we left Portland about 5 years ago. The reality is that people like having the ease of use of a car - and trying to force a dogma on people is going to be a losing proposition.

Unless you live right next to where you work - or your work is right on the route of public transportation which does not even happen in NYC - people are going to find it much easier to get around in a car - so planning for what actually happens instead of some utopia that people do not like is reasonable.

 

[Hobbesarable]

Even my wife a teacher for 40 years says unfortunately the school system is broke in this State and the students and parents are the ones paying for it. Benchmarked against other states we are laggards in this area.
If there is not a plan to significantly improve the system from one year to the next it will only get worse.

I was a teacher and I've seen the system. It is sad to see many students not ready for the next grade level pushed through the system.

 

[SlyPokerDog]

I was a teacher and I've seen the system. It is sad to see many students not ready for the next grade level pushed through the system.

I'm remember being with a kid in the 8th grade who had been held back a couple of years, he would drive himself to school.

He should have been social promoted.

 

[Boob-No-More]

I'm remember being with a kid in the 8th grade who had been held back a couple of years, he would drive himself to school.

He should have been social promoted.

Louie Hietzman. He smelled like cigarettes and Brut aftershave - in 7th grade.

BNM

 

[MarAzul]

A thriving high tech industry that's created tens of thousands of high paying jobs to replace those of the dying timber and fishing industries.

You can argue the good/bad trade-offs that came with those jobs and the associated growth, but if we'd have had Republican governors for the last 30 years I doubt we have the high tech industry we currently have. Republicans have traditionally tried to prop up dying industries with tax subsidies as a way of pandering to their core voter base, but in the case where the supply of product is being rapidly depleted, those are band-aid approaches that don't offer long term solutions.

Making chips and selling software is more sustainable than cutting down old growth forests and fishing our rivers barren.

BNM

Yeah, here is a good article on the subject.
https://www.nytimes.com/1999/06/09/us/fighting-sprawl-oregon-county-makes-deal-with-intel-to-limit-job-growth.html

It does seem odd though, while giving out the tax breaks, they don't want too many jobs created. That brings people you know, and they need a house. But then the Oregon Dems have no
problem with tens of thousands of immigrants coming over the last few decades.
It sort of wipes out the image from the Ghost of Tom McCall.
https://www.ocpp.org/2013/12/15/blog20131215-intel-deal-ghost-tom-mccall/

 

[MarAzul]

There's this little thing called size of the population, which is huge. You're gonna get some dirty air and floating trash from somewhere around 2-3 Billion people.
In Korea, when I was last there about ten or 15 years ago, they didn't even have light rail. They did have people trains but they were much heavier and larger than light rail. Public transportation was amazingly cheap and ubiquitous.

I had a great time the last time I was in Korea.
Visted a Customer, the Shinhan bank. One of the Managers there was a former SK Naval Officer, took me to visit my old ship, well known in the country then, and now a Memorial.
And then the great one, watch Sabas and his team play some damn good basketball.

 

[SlyPokerDog]

I had a great time the last time I was in Korea.
Visted a Customer, the Shinhan bank. One of the Managers there was a former SK Naval Officer, took me to visit my old ship, well known in the country then, and now a Memorial.
And then the great one, watch Sabas and his team play some damn good basketball.

And you were in the 8th grade?

 

[MarAzul]

And you were in the 8th grade?

a misquote sly.

 

[MarAzul]

Not sure why y'all don't remember the republicans that used to run our state.

Oh, I remember it. It was a damn fine place then.

 

[calvin natt]

I’ve said this multiple times but I travel a lot for work and NOWHERE do I see fucking tents all over the place.

Our education system is shit.

I don’t vote Republican but I wanted to get new blood for the love of god. Kate Brown and the constant flow of retread Democrats isn’t getting it done.

 

[SlyPokerDog]

I’ve said this multiple times but I travel a lot for work and NOWHERE do I see fucking tents all over the place.

Our education system is shit.

Our education system can't be that bad if our homeless can set up tents while others can't.

 

[MARIS61]

He does. But so does she. Read up:

https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/11/kate_brown_changes_course_dema.html

Kate Brown changes course, demands $64 million Medicaid repayment

Gov. Kate Brown on Tuesday directed the state's top health official to seek repayment of $64 million in Medicaid money that the state wrongly sent to health care organizations.

The governor sent the letter a day after her likely Republican opponent in the 2018 election, Rep. Knute Buehler of Bend, wrote his own letter calling for the governor to recoup the money.

The Oregonian/OregonLive first disclosed the Medicaid overpayments, which it learned about through a public records request, last week.

In her first public statement on the issue last week, Brown did not call for repayment. State health authority leaders said at the time that unidentified previous agency "leadership" had made a policy decision not to ask health care groups it contracts with to pay back the $64 million.

Brown's letter directs them to reverse that stance. Brown wrote in the letter to Patrick Allen, acting director of the Oregon Health Authority, that "taxpayers are counting on you to take to take swift action and have zero tolerance for the waste of their taxpayer dollars."

In his critique of Brown's management, Buehler also called for Brown to appoint an independent lawyer to investigate the overpayments and release her administration's communications on the issue. But Brown has not directly responded to those suggestions. The governor said last week she only learned of the problem in mid-October.

In her directive Tuesday, Brown requested that Allen submit a written report on the issue every two weeks and develop a dedicated website on which to publish public records requests and related documents. She commended Allen for being "dogged and transparent" since taking the top job at the health authority in August.

Brown installed Allen to replace Lynne Saxton, who resigned under fire after agency documents revealed the health authority plotted to smear an adversarial health care organization. The health authority has struggled to effectively administer the Medicaid program that was vastly expanded by the Affordable Care Act.

It's at least the second time this year Brown has asked the health agency to provide regular updates on its work to resolve Medicaid problems. In May, Brown demanded weekly updates as the department struggled to clear a backlog of Medicaid eligibility checks.

The overpayments, which totaled $74 million from 2014 through 2016 according to the health authority, occurred because the state incorrectly enrolled people in Medicaid, apparently unaware they were also old enough to qualify for Medicare. When people are old enough for Medicare and poor enough for Medicaid, Medicare generally covers most of the patients' costs. Instead, Oregon's health agency signed people up for Medicaid as if they had no other health coverage.

After the federal government caught the problem last year, the state asked the companies that administer Medicaid, known as coordinated care organizations, to repay the $10 million they were overpaid in 2016. But health officials decided not to ask for the money wrongly dispensed in 2014 and 2015, even though the federal government could still ask Oregon to repay it.

In a possible reference to Buehler and other critics of the state's handling of its Medicaid program, Brown asked Allen to "remain focused on that goal and ignore the political games that a few are playing with the ability to provide health care to more than a million Oregonians."

You do realize that article exposes huge failures and crimes by Dems serving under Kitzhaber/Brown management, following her direction and passing whatever scrutiny she applied to their performance since being gifted the position of Governor. Then she had to be publicly called out by a Rep before she agreed to do something/anything.

 

[MARIS61]

We don't want their policies.

The people said that last night.

Everything I voted for won.

Geographically, most of it lost.

Brown won in only about 2 dozen of Oregon's 241 cities. Same for most of the measures.

Oregon needs an electoral college with 1 vote for each city.

 

[dviss1]

The problem with our schools lies in how they are funded.

Whoever the fuck decided we should pay for schools with property taxes was a fucking idiot.

I was a Junior at Cleveland HS when measure 5 passed.

Why don't y'all look at that funding cut?

Why don't y'all look at the fact that the funding was cut to ALL of our PPS magnet programs.

MFs will complain and say the system is broken but not say shit about teachers having to purchase supplies with THEIR money?

The way we find schools makes it so the school in the neighborhood that has the most 3 car garages get more funding than the ones who have more apartments.

It's fucking stupid.

 

[barfo]

Geographically, most of it lost.

Brown won in only about 2 dozen of Oregon's 241 cities. Same for most of the measures.

Oregon needs an electoral college with 1 vote for each city.

Portland can split into a million tiny cities, then, and La Pine's vote still won't matter.

barfo

 

[barfo]

Our education system can't be that bad if our homeless can set up tents while others can't.

No, it's our sanctuary city status. Homeless illegal immigrants will do the work of setting up tents that American homeless people refuse to do.

barfo