We are not doomed. The code of the looters is doomed. Rand gave us the war plan in Atlas Shrugged.

The real issue with Obamacare is that by expanding Medicaid to include people with 4 x poverty levels, the government turned people who are in the maker class into takers. The offer of "free" medical care when faced with the horrible alternative of $12K/yr premiums and $10K deductibles was too tempting to pass up. I have no doubt that many who pulled the Republican lever when voting are in this group now.

The intent all along was always to create an unpalatable situation to instill a desire for single payer. As P.J. O'Rourke has said many times, if you think medical care is expensive, wait until it's free. California voters wailed for single payer until the price came back at $400B/yr, requiring a tripling of the state's budget. Even if the VA, Medicare, and Medicaid were absorbed into a new "Medicare for all," as Bernie Sanders likes to call it, it would still require an additional $3 trillion added to an already bloated federal budget to provide single payer for all American residents.

I was assigned to Australia in the mid-70s when they tried single payer, and it promised exploding deficits. Fortunately for the Aussies, deficits are banned by their constitution. After the Labor government tried to sneak loans from Swiss bankers, the Governor General disbanded the government (the ultimate "You're fired"), and instituted new elections which resulted in a saner leadership. We don't have a Governor General like Commonwealth countries, who can impeach everyone at one time, so we're stuck with the doofuses we gullibly elect.

When I was 12, my dad had me read Atlas Shrugged. I was already a very conservative young boy, but that book convinced me that we needed a new revolution. Living in the suburbs of Dallas gave me a unique perspective from her book. Takers are in all strata of society. Unless we get rid of all government programs that aren't directly protecting our boarders or our citizens I.e. Police and fire, we will always have someone talk about putting a chicken in every pot or paying for someone's college! We need an article V and an amendment getting rid of any and all social programs. When Ayn said the story of Robin Hood wasn't about a hero but a true thief, it changed for me all the nursery rhymes and stories I ever heard. I started looking at them as what they were, indoctrination of our young towards a socialist society.

I stated at the outset of the last election that there was no determination to repeal the ACA no matter who was elected. The healthcare act does not provide healthcare coverage and discussing whether or not it does is irrelevant in to the fact that it was never designed to. It was designed to collect large amounts of money and pay only enough out to convince the populace that they have something that doesn't exist. The purpose of the act is to take currency out of circulation to prevent hyper inflation, the congress, president and courts understand and know if they repeal the ACA they will have a much larger problem which is why they find excuses not to act on the promise they made.
As far as the national debt when the country works with fiat currency and a banking monopoly there is no way to address the debt problem. Since all fiat currency is created by debt to pay off the debt would remove all currency from circulation and leave the debt of interest and no way to pay it. The country needs a monetary system (not policy that policymakers invent) that represents value and free trade (reality and an objective reaction to it). What America has is a monopolistic confidence game where the last person holding the dollar loses. We are demanding free enterprise using their arguments about monetary policy, no matter where we take a stand on the argument of collectivism we still lose.
The ACA will not be repealed anymore than Obama would end the war on terrorism and bring the troops home as he promised. He knew he couldn't do it, just made the promise to get elected and enriched by the policymakers after his term of office. He knows the ACA won't provide healthcare and doesn't care he is merely trying to sell the lie. Get ready for serious economic difficulties ahead and get used to living with them as long as 1) we continue to think we must have leaders and obey them and 2) you think the majority of people prefer liberty, they prefer slavery so expect its continuation.

Here are several proposals I think would go a long way toward helping restore good government practice:

1. A Balanced Budget Amendment. Pretty simple: Congress can't spend more than we take in (including interest expenses). I would make the maximum budget available based on the actual tax receipts from two years ago.
2. A Constitutional Amendment stating that no other legislation may come to the floor of either the House or Senate until the Constitutionally-mandated Budget has been passed - save a Declaration of War.
3. Repeal of the 17th Amendment. Return the election and oversight of Senators to their respective States.
4. Repeal of the 12th Amendment. Eliminate the party system of voting for President and Vice President on the same ticket. Return it to what it was: the highest vote-getter being President and second-most becoming Vice President with ties broken in the House of Representatives.
5. Increase the number of seats in the House of Representatives to one representative for every 200,000 citizens. (Employ the technology for remote meeting attendance!)
6. Restrict campaign financing support to only those constituents residing for voting purposes within a Representative's precinct. No PAC's, no Party fundraising - just grassroots donations and interests at play.
7. Eliminate ALL unions of government employees including teachers, air traffic controllers, etc.
8. A Constitutional Amendment putting the responsibility for funding of all Congressional offices and staffers on their represented States (this includes healthcare and retirement plans - if any).
9. A Constitutional Amendment setting the allowed Cabinet positions and limiting them to State, Treasury, Interior, and Justice. Additional Cabinet positions would have to be set and approved by Constitutional Amendment from that point forward.

Trotsky.

I like the way you bring an alternate view to the discussions, CG. May not agree with you very often, but it's good to hear (and remember) there are others who don't follow the "rigid objectivist party line"...

What makes me laugh are the "objectivists" who see your name and AUTOMATICALLY give you a down vote, regardless of what you've written. Somehow, to me, that's not even close to "objective" and more like the crowd with firebrands and pitchforks driving the evil witch from town because of their red hair...

Here, here!

Neither of which were any kind of realistically desirable leadership - one was for escalating the war and pushing a liberal statist agenda, the other was for global thermonuclear war to eliminate the then-bogeyman.

The real problem was we were (and still are) so entrenched in the "mandatory 2 party only system" that any alternative is untenable... You MUST have either A or B, and anything else is a "wasted vote of failure", no matter how bad the A or B choice was or is.

Simply - you are REQUIRED, socially and morally and almost legally to vote for the "Two-Named Monoparty". How many tell you if you vote for someone outside this "you are wasting your vote", or worse, :a vote for (3rd party) is a vote for (insert enemy of the person speaking here)...

So which would you rather have? Lenin or Trotsky? Because they're BOTH the same thing...

The only problem with an Article V is it opens the door to not just what we want, but what the populist leftist urban majority wants... if there were a way to do this without turning on the fire hose for those who would hydraulically mine away the mountain of freedom, I would be all for it... but one must be cautious, as there is such a radically leftist bent out there right now that it could result in an outcome we neither expect nor desire...

Problem is that "takers" are out numbering "payers".

CG - you do make some sense for me. The quote is from Tytler about the demise of democracy. I see Cloward - Piven and Alinsky (sp?) as the driving force behind our demise. Their goal is a socialist utopia with them in charge. Can you say Venezuela? I worry for my 15 year old daughter - in what kind of world are we going to leave her? We are becoming a nation pf sheeple and I search for an actual Gulch.

When it gets bad enough, an armed resolution may be a viable solution. We've had two civil wars, why not a third? The alternative, 50 years from now, is a caliphate. The big problem will be how to pray towards mecca, as it is directly underneath us?

Me dino has signed an online petition to support this.

I've been saying "we are doomed" since Goldwater lost to LBJ.

Speaking of doom, most clocks go "tick, tick, tick!"
Here's the one that goes, "Doom, doom doom!"
We're about to make $20 trillion in debt history, y'all. Yay!
And we all got to llive to see it!
Me dino remembers where I was when I heard JFK was assassinated.
Where will you be when you first hear about the Big Bad 20T?
Me dino just loves historical events. Don't you?
Someone gave me the Apollo 13 DVD for Christmas.
And I watched it all the way through one whole time!
Even though it is a pretty good movie . . . for a movie.
http://www.usdebtclock.org/

I really don't know why any Republican is worried about voting this down....Mitt Romney was right....47% of people are takers and will never vote for a Republican.......unless in a drunken or drug induced stupor, they push the wrong button. The republican lawmakers shouldn't be worried about the "Recipients" but the "payers"!!! I am tired about hearing of the problems of the underclass and the downtrodden,....what abnout me! If you prick me do I not bleed??? I am beig robbed every day by deadbeats and parasites. If these people cant make it on their own they should be selected out. If we do not allow this to happen all we will eventually have is the weak and lame and the next thing you know we will be conquered...probably by a Muslim Caliphate.

Thus, another example of why we so desperately need to call and Article V convention!. Once called I would like to see it continue with a mandate/function of nullifying (or evaluating for nullification) everything the "real congress" passes.

WOW so many have so much to say.
Do not forget that Ayn Rand saw and wrote about the demise of the country years ago as I expect many of you knew, I did not have to remind you.
The problem is as she pointed out ALTRUISM. I have believed for many years that the country was doomed as Storo points out. Pity the young!

But, notice she hasn't gone away. She's like a serious operation; no longer lethal but leaves an ugly scar.

I'm with you there on every point.

Okay, now I get it. Just hit me with a 2x4. :)

And it's what he wants? That makes sense but it not wat he states. Must be a politician. :)

Some purposely spread misinformation and ignore calls to support their statements.

He gets it, Ed