Some notes about Republican debates thus far:
The media is being a bit unfair in criticizing the audience response in these debates.
The gay soldier? Totally outrageous. I don’t have much opinion on this coverage that varies from my normal beliefs. I am upset that no one defended the man’s service to his country.
The theoretical thirty year old? It wasn’t some poor uninsured kid that the question was hypothetically framing It was a person who could totally afford their insurance and chose not to pay and suddenly gets a stroke or seizure or something, thus ending up in a coma. Again, we can openly debate what society should do in that case and if we should have any responsibility to insure for our own health risks. But pundits and anchors alike are painting this as letting someone who had no choice die slowly from cancer, which is some of the set ups I’ve been hearing. Imagine an extremely rich person never got health insurance, blew their cash, and then got really sick. Should the government pay for their expenses when they were careless? That’s the idea of being free to take your own risks. They aren’t outright saying that those that aren’t well off don’t deserve any social safety net.
The death row stats? Again, this is more debatable in my opinion. If you’re for the death penalty instead of letting awful, harmful criminals who you believe cannot be rehabilitated be a burden on the tax payers though the system, you’d be excited to hear about a state being proactive in pursuing ultimate judgement. The view point is debatable, but these people aren’t craving blood or cheering for death. They see this as an ultimate form of justice for the worst of crimes. That number is an enforcement of that to them, they envision the worst of society, not the couple of innocents that may or may not have ended up in the shuffle.
Just felt like saying something about this, usually both sides are heard somehow (even if one side is HUGELY heard,) but I haven’t heard much defense of these points and it’s been getting pretty hyperbolic. Some food for thought, I suppose?
