"You (meaning Democrats) are not getting my money" she said.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

I couldn't believe it! One of my neighbors scurried past with her dog today and shouted back at me "you are not getting our money". This was unusual behavior for my neighbor. I trotted off after her to ask her what she meant. She said "your Obama people won't get our money!" "For what" I asked. "For socialist healthcare" she said. This woman doesn't work and her husband lost his job (they don't have any money to give and are in debt). So being in a devilish mood today, I asked her how she was going to pay for healthcare? She said she didn't know but she could be seen if she went to the ER. I said "do you realize it is you who is costing 'us' money by going to the ER and that we as a country pay much more than countries like the UK and Canada on healthcare?" and gave her my soapbox speech on the British NHS and Canadian healthcare service. She tried to get away. Her reply was "why don't you go and live there then" and shot in her front door.

Well, this is what we are up against. Have you had an encounter like this?

[NC_Nurse]

1. What a dipshit. You could've just said "What money?", but I guess that would

be mean. Good for you for trying to explain things to a dumbass. Maybe something will stick.

[eShirl]

18. I would have said it.

Too bad for her; if someone gets in my face, they're getting egg on it.

[Tansy_Gold]

2. I suspect we've all had encounters like this

I've had many.

I'm really beginning to hate these people even more than I thought I could.



TG

[ej510]

4. Aww willful ignorance.

It's a lot of that in this country.

[Kerrytravelers]

3. What I'd had wanted to say, and this isn't very nice:

"What money? You don't a job or money." And then laughed.

But you were right to try and educate her.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

10. I guess she will try to go on another route tomorrow!

[depakid]

5. "Have you had an encounter like this?"

Thousands of them over the years in many contexts- both personal and professional.

As to her advice...:think:

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

6. "Oh yeah you are, and if you don't I'm reporting you to the Death Panel".

[Clio the Leo]

7. Poor dog!

People that dumb shouldn't be allowed to own them! ;)

[tularetom]

8. Every frickin day

There's a lot of things i like about living where I do but all the assholes who live nearby ain't one of them.

I can't tell you how many discussions I've had that have ended just like yours. It's finally gotten to the point where if somebody starts talking like your neighbor my response is "Let's either discuss something else or end this conversation right now".

Most of them will drop it. Those that won't, fuck em. I don't need to talk to douchebags like that anyway.

[Hepburn]

28. Ditto....

...they just do NOT get what is going on.

[Buzz Clik]

9. Damn! Get a net.

"I won't pay for socialist health care, but you f***ers will pay for my visit to the ER when I'm sick."

Strange times, indeed.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

11. They just don't seem to get it!

[Cha]

12. If someone goes off on me like that bc they are mainlining bech

then I will ask them, "what do you think Medicare is for our citizens over 65?"

Of which I am now one but I haven't signed up yet for the basic service.

[Sub Atomic]

13. Why don't you go live there then??

I would have told her because I have too much fun making fun of idiots like her.

[Diamonique]

14. I applaud your restraint. I would have gone off on the old bitch.

She would have run into the house screaming after I was done telling her where to get off.

And she would NEVER open up a conversation like that with anyone ever again.

[DrToast]

15. You should have said: Off to the death panel, with you!

And then started laughing maniacally.

[NRaleighLiberal]

16. There is NO reaching these people. They are long gone.

This is what Obama and the Dems must realize. It is ingrained in their belief system - whether it is racism, greed, or just religious brainwashing - THEY ARE GONE. FORGET THEM.

[texastoast]

17. I just did with my best friend from first grade

We still stay in touch (though it has been more occasionally than it used to be). She emailed on Friday to tell me she had almost died from a radical hysterectomy in June. I called her today to follow up. When she told me the story, I smelled malpractice, but the damages are so little (a few weeks' work and some pain and suffering--she still can't pee right) that she will never find a lawyer to represent her. The discussion got around to insurance and she said, "This Obama is going to kill us all." I said, "What did you say?" She very hesitantly repeated it. I tried to explain that she needed to go listen to stories of the citizens of the countries who have public health care and learn the facts for herself. I talked about the insurance whores and our fucked up lobbying system. I asked her why Americans can't learn from other countries who have great success with public health. I could hear her glaze over oh the phone.

My friend wouldn't listen to me in high school when I told her to get herself to the clinic and get some birth control. She got pregnant and dropped out of high school. She's uneducated and has struggled for most of her life.

I told her that I thought Obama had the most vision of anyone in the White House since JFK. She replied, "And we know how that turned out." THAT creeped me

It's so damned ironic. She's Catholic and her parents voted for JFK just because of his religion. You would think that a rare white Catholic in my hometown could identify with the persecution of a black and white president. But no. Racism is just ingrained there.

I'm so sad. I don't know how to reach her.

[Drunken Irishman]

19. You should have shoved her to the ground, broke her arm...

And then said, "now enjoy finding money for that break you dumb piece of shit".

:D

[Schema Thing]

21. NO!

No way should she have left the scene w/o taking some money for her trouble.

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

29. Subtle, I like it.

:toast:

[Hansel]

20. Tell her going to the ER is practicing socialism

Because since she cannot afford to pay for it, all tax payers are forced to pay her bill.

Ask her why she wouldn't just go to a doctor's office and paid for it herself instead of engaging in socialism.

[Ikonoklast]

30. This is the correct answer.

She's one of the freeloaders she rants about.

Who does she think gets the bill she refuses to pay?

The rest of us.

[Vinca]

22. You should have kicked her off the socialist sidewalk.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

24. Yes we should label the sidewalks

for Socialists only! They can find their own private ones!

[Solomon]

37. HaHa!

LOL. Socialist sidewalks. :rofl:

[Chulanowa]

23. A few weeks ago, I was riding the bus to work

I had brought my copy of Howard Zinn's "A people's History of the United States" with me to have something to do on breaks. I notice this older guy looking at the book's cover and looking a mite perturbed. When I reached my stop, the old fart had apparently worked up enough spit to bellow out, "YOU GO BACK TO RUSSIA YOU COMMIE PUNK!"

I looked back, and his face looked like a beet, he was just livid. So I laughed at him, a nice, well-practiced laugh that conveys "you're a fucking idiot" just perfectly, and kept laughing as I got off the bus.

[DavidDvorkin]

25. She prefers to have the corporations get it.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

34. she doesn't realize that CEOs of health insrance companies get millions in salary and perks

[DavidDvorkin]

38. Regarding which, look at this shocking video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G4TsaHmtgfA

[Rosa Luxemburg]

42. Villains!

[jwirr]

26. Many of these outbursts are emotions of the moment actions. I remember

sitting on the sofa in front of the tv in 1968 angry enough to scream. As the violence developed at the convention I became angrier and more emotional. My blood pressure shot sky high and I felt sick at heart. I suspect that many of the rw are reacting to what they are seeing in the same way. But unlike those of us in the living room in 1968 we did not want to go out and hurt our neighbors. Today the rw neighbors just want to hit out against anyone - when it all calms down they are the ones who will feel silly.

[TrogL]

46. No they won't

They cannot allow themselves to "feel silly". They cannot allow themselves any sort of introspection or they would go barking mad and kill themselves.

You were having an emotional response to cognitive dissonance. They want to kill you for proposing that two plus to is not equal to five.

[KingFlorez]

27. More nuttiness

As much as I disliked Republican policy under Bush, I never went out and yelled random nonsense to Republicans. They need to get a grip.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

31. Yes I think they are losing it

you just have to look at them all in DC yesterday

[mascarax]

32. If you 'went and lived there then', who would pay for HER healthcare?

Also, it always seems like these people do a 'drive by' - like this I'd term a 'drive by shout' where she's scurrying past but throws her insult back over her shoulder. This ignorance still gets to me.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

33. I guess she must have got fired up after watching TV?

normally she just passes by says hi or talks about the weather.

[and-justice-for-all]

35. Better call the IRS on her then...

sounds like she is refusing to pay her taxes, how unAmerican of her.

[Monk06]

36. There is no greater love than that of a slave for his master. These people are the dupes of rich

Corporate Oligarchs who view them the same
way medieval lords viewed their serfs: as chattel
just like the land and the other beasts living on it.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

43. Yes I think you are right

[donquijoterocket]

39. socialism

I realize how futile it is to even try to get a few facts through to people of this sort, but I might have tried this starting with asking her If I could stop them from getting "my money" for misguided military misadventures by virtue of the fact that:War has all the characteristics of socialism most conservatives hate: Centralized power, state planning, false rationalism, restricted liberties, foolish optimism about intended results, and blindness to unintended secondary results".

[Rosa Luxemburg]

47. They speak the mantras of people like Beck

[zulchzulu]

40. Have your neighbot visit stopmybenefits.com today!

If your neighbot really doesn't want socialized, government-run health care, all she has to do is go here:

www.stopmybenefits.com

Just fill out the form to get rid of her benefits (and her husband too...) and voila! She won't burden herself with health care benefits! It's so easy!

[Rosa Luxemburg]

48. wouldn't that be hilarious!

[Arugula Latte]

41. Hopefully her medical bills will overwhelm her and she'll lose her house and leave your neighborhood

Dumbass.

[Doctor_J]

44. think of hate radio and Cable "news", especially Fox

then think of what it will take to get them off of the air. There's your solution

[TrogL]

45. You cannot reach these people

Authoritarian types live in their little constructed world they call "conservatism" (which it isn't) listening to their leaders, memorizing their talking points so they know what to "think" (read "chant around the water cooler at work").

They cannot listen to any sort of extended explanation because they cannot follow it. You cannot have a discussion with them on any topic (such as health care) because you cannot have a discussion with them - they don't have the tools.

Their idea of conversation, discussion, discourse is to listen to you make noises until they recognize the trigger for them to cough up the next "talking point" memorized from Rush. "Why don't you go and live there" is straight out of their playbook.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

49. I wonder what they would do if

they didn't have cable TV?

[TrogL]

50. What they used to do - parrot their preacher

[mitchum]

51. Maybe that stupid bitch will starve to death before she can vote in the next election

[Rosa Luxemburg]

53. she drove the dog today!

I bet she was taking the dog to the park - she sneaked out.

[mitchum]

54. Poor dog (n/t)

[ChimpersMcSmirkers]

55. And now she's under seige!

Fucking socialists.

[Duke Newcombe]

52. The facts, they are like Kryptonite to this bunch. n/t