read this. and let me know.

[coloradodem2005]

As a fellow grad student, I understand your concerns. I'll have a significant chunk of debt under my belt when I graduate and not be able to pay it back for probably another decade. As an American I value my rights, liberties, and freedoms, and their erosion under any administration is painful. The economic situation right now is not pleasent, but it *is* improving though probably for different reasons than most political analysts would care to admit (then again the whole cause of this mess is in that category too).

Class is not what this election is about. This is about power, and class is a convenient way for people who want power to distract from what they want to do with it. Kerry wants to spend enough to generate a deficit running at $900 billion for 2005 alone. Basic math: in order to pay for something, you need money. That money is going to come from you and me, not from the exceptionally wealthy like George Soros who are bankrolling the election. Remember, the three wealthiest Senators have more money than the other 97 put together, and if memory serves the top 3 are all Democrats (Kerry is at top of list).

Yeah, rich people keep a lot of their money. But they also pay over half the taxes in this country. How about we get rid of the IRS and move to the FairTax plan? I'd rather keep all of my (miniscule) cash from my summer job and pay for it with capital purchases later on: it's more fair to the populace at large and you pay in taxes what you demand in goods and sevices.

I do not know what state you are in, but in the South things work a bit differently than at the federal level. The "Red Clay" Democrats of Georgia are a great example, they would likely be deemed Republicans in most states and probably deemed "hard-liners" in California and the Northeast. They support the 2nd amendment enough to still allow people to carry concealed weapons and purchsae firearms at gun shows. They support a balanced budget. They also support the military to a great extent, probably because of the multitiude of DOD facilities here.

Personally I find people like Senator Clinton and Senator Santorum to be examples of more extreme versions of the Left and Right. One seems to want to *socialize* medicine, expand government power, concentrate authority into one office, and seems to have a severe problem with people that do not agree with the policies espoused, never mind a long memory. The other seems to cite religious reasons for quite a few bits of legislation, actually tried to get Congress to cite a religious alternative to evolution as something available for education in a public school science classroom, and seems to think that the nation should conform to the narrow moral spectrum of *fundamentalist Protestant* christianity. Both of these people seem to want power for the sake of molding the nation to their personal vision without much care about what other people hold to be the values of this nation and might be tempted to discourage those who would think otherwise.

So what do you propose to do, Kyle? How would you solve the problem?

[oldhat]

1. Where is this retard getting his facts?

A fucking Ouija board?

Where did he get the $900 billion figure? And what's this about Soros (read: Jew) "bankrolling" the election?

"But they also pay over half the taxes in this country." According to Rush Limbaugh.

Forget this guy. You're not going to convert him. It's pointless talking to these kinds of people -- you're arguing with his opinion, not facts.

Just volunteer at the Kerry campaign headquarters and work on your local congressional races. It's a better use of your time.

[Cleita]

3. That I agree with.

:hi:

[coloradodem2005]

8. I just told him....

...how do you know that Kerry will not make the rich pay their share? And I invoked Eisenhower over the military industrial complex and Reagan over the "Are we better off" quote. I also told him that he is not telling me everything. The thing is, this is a site called www.othertimelines.com. THere seem to be a lot of freeptards there. There are more decent ones but there are a whole bunch of idiots. I told him I would raise taxes on the people making more than $100K a year and asked him what he would do. Republicans are idiots.

[Cleita]

2. During the era of Lyndon Johnson, education didn't cost what

it does now. Most state universities were tuition free for residents as long as one kept one's grades up. It took a Reagan and Nixon to change this. Two Bushes killed the last bird. In the future students like yourself probably won't even be able to float loans to keep you broke for the next decade. I guess we have gone back to the depression. :shrug:

[DeadHead67]

10. Why, when I started college in the late 60's. . . .

I went to a community college which was a part of our local educational system. I didn't need a grant or student loan, or anything. Why? I shit you not, my cost per semester, was $15 for student activities, and I had to buy my books (as I recall, under $100) Now, this same 'college' compares with what I would have had to pay for a major residential university, at that time.

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. The "Red Clay" Democrats

Does this refer to the contents of the brain pan of this guy?

[cidliz2004]

5. Lost cause

unless you would like to tell him ask him to locate his brain and when he does and ONLY when he does, you will be happy to engage in an intelligent thoughtful conversation with him.

OR

Ask him to back up some of his claims with documented facts by moderate, conservative and liberal experts on some of the issues that he has mentioned.

[drhilarius]

6. Send your grad school buddy this.

As a grad student myself, I find this very troubling.
<http://www.sendbushyourstudentloanbill.com/index.php?flash=yes>

[Green Lantern]

7. I don't believe

this is an actual life long dem. Look at the moniker.

Look at the tax crap-who the hell did the rich get their money from in the first place? Had their hands in my pocket, among many others. Did Enron-ers truly "earn" their wealth?

Look at the "socialize" health under Clinton. Hell, we had socialized medicine in the US Navy. All you had to do was go on sick call.

Look at the info given on class warfare and re-read posts here on "What's the Matter with Kansas". This is, in all likelihood, a mod repub who is in search mode, not a lib/prog.

It is either a red herring or someone in search mode who hasn't been able to get past all the rubbish they have been fed for years.

[coloradodem2005]

9. Sadly, there seem to be people that agree with him.

They say that I am unwilling to listen. Yeah, because it is bullshit.

[Green Lantern]

11. I am sorry to say

that I think we are getting beyond listening and getting up to yelling.
it's hard to decide what to do, where to go, with all the background noise we get nowadays.