Love the title of the thread.

I hate to break it to both of you, but both parties are losing their identity to the big money both sides have to raise to run. The big money isn't a Dem problem or a Rep problem. It's rapidly becoming an american problem. The politicians have to have it and it has to be paid back. Not usually to the betterment of america either.

I'm not wanting to see the demise of the democratic party.  I just want all the current democrats to resign and stay home.  And most of the Republicans can do the same.

Where is Tip O'Neal and Ronald Reagan when we need them?  At least they got compromises done over a beer at Happy Hour in the White House.

Martinis .

I don't think either party is trustworthy. What the Alabama Republican party is doing in the legislature right now, especially with Education funds, is downright appalling. 

What are they doing that appalls you so?

You can take the entire Alabama legislature and the Tennessee legislature, put both of them in a paper bag and shake it up. Draw one of em out, it don't matter which one you get, there ain't a bit of difference in both of them. They both want whatever the 1% want and don't care how they hurt public schools or the average income people.

No specifics, of course. Dems would rather stay on course charted by AEA/NEA that produced the failing schools. Better to sacrifice students than do something, which Republicans are attempting.

They can't tell us why they're 'appalled'.

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Feelings, feelings, nothing but feelings...

Dems would rather stay on course charted by AEA/NEA that produced the failing schools. 

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Do you think parents may have something to do with "failing schools"?

A very dangerous proposition was just floated in the legislature by Gerald Dial and Del Marsh, combining the education and general fund budgets. The education budget has been continually cut for the last five years. School board get 30% less money to work with than five years ago. Yet, politicians want the "flexibility" of a combined budget. Flexibility means stealing from the education budget to fill the general fund hole. The so-called "accountability act" and the charter schools bill, already are stealing tens of millions more from the education fund. Education funds were "earmarked" decades ago because the public didn't trust politicians to use the funds for education and the ways they were intended. 

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Parents affect students on a one-to-one basis.  To assume that students are failing because all parents are affecting students in a negative fashion is a false assumption. One must look to that which the students have in common -- curriculum and teachers.

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Parents affect students on a one-to-one basis.  To assume that students are failing because all parents are affecting students in a negative fashion is a false assumption. One must look to that which the students have in common -- curriculum and teachers.

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All students are not failing. Did you ever think what it does to a class to have a special needs child in it. Sometimes it brings the whole class down. Sometimes it may help bring the special needs child up. How much teaching time is used filling out government mandated forms to show how much time you are spending on each subject?

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First, its failing schools that are the target of reform. Plus, complaining about government regulations -- how could you.  Perhaps, you see a bit fo the problems small to moderate sized companies have staying afloat.

First, its failing schools that are the target of reform. Plus, complaining about government regulations -- how could you.  Perhaps, you see a bit fo the problems small to moderate sized companies have staying afloat.

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Please explain that a little better.

I remember when education wasn't a problem. Public, private or otherwise.

The trouble came with liberal government.

The future of politics will look nothing like it does today. It will be much more liberal and progressive. Doesn't matter what the parties call themselves. 

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You might be right and the young fools will deserve it as they toil on the collective for their equal share of misery. As Ayn Rand put it: "Socialism is the doctrine that man has no right to exist for his own sake, that his life and his work do not belong to him, but belong to society, that the only justification of his existence is his service to society, and that society may dispose of him in any way it pleases for the sake of whatever it deems to be its own tribal, collective good."

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Don't know whether the forms are mandated at the state or federal level, but no matter.

I recently posted that government regulations at the federal level costs the economy and, this, the US consumer 10 percent of the GDP.

https://www.tnvalleytalks.com/t...s-cost-1-88-trillion

"Federal regulation and intervention cost American consumers and businesses an estimated $1.88 trillion in 2014 in lost economic productivity and higher prices.

Economy-wide regulatory costs amount to an average of $14,976 per household – around 29 percent of an average family budget of $51,100. Although not paid directly by individuals, this “cost” of regulation exceeds the amount an average family spends on health care, food and transportation."

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So, your are predicting a massive rise in the crime rate and murder, in particular.

An economy based upon economic theories honed in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, relying upon that theory, rather than what is actually happening in the marketplace, it that it. Prepare yourself to live in a second world economy and your children and their heirs to live in a third word economy.

Federal regulation and intervention cost American consumers and businesses an estimated $1.88 trillion in 2014 in lost economic productivity and higher prices.

Economy-wide regulatory costs amount to an average of $14,976 per household – around 29 percent of an average family budget of $51,100. 

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That sure is a big number

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That is your own doomsday, fear mongering prediction Dire. I said no such thing. I have faith in the next generation. They are smarter than you give them credit for. They have seen the failures of the economic policies we live under now. 

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Yes, Dems have given us nothing but misery.  Not my prediction, just what happens when progressives get their hooks in -- simple observation,

So no Republican administration, or Congress member has ever had any effect on the countries economic policies? Is that what you are saying? Reagan was just a figure head that did nothing to help or hurt the US, Bush 1? Bush 2? All completely ineffective...?

Yes, Dems have given us nothing but misery.  Not my prediction, just what happens when progressives get their hooks in -- simple observation,

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Republicans gave us the "robber barons" of the late 1800's and early 1900's. And the great depression of the 1930's.

Democrats gave us unions which led to the middle class and SS which gave elderly people security.

Reagan was just a figure head that did nothing to help or hurt the US

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Jank, I have to disagree. Reagan killed construction and set in place these trickledown policies which have hurt the working class as much as anything in history.

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The late 1800s and early 1900s were a mix of Democrat and Republican administrations,  The greatest economic expansion was during the Harding/Coolidge administrations,  They approached a minor recession by cutting taxes and government spending -- results, greatest economic expansion in US history. Hoover had a similar recession and decided to raise tariffs, despite warnings from economists.  Tariffs were raised, other nations responded in kind -- great depression.   Hoover's move was considered progressive. 

Of the three great railways, government subsidized two with free land to build transcontinental routes. The third bought the land on their own It succeeded, the other two went bankrupt.

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In what nation did Reagan kill construction, it certainly wasn't the US!

http://www.tradingeconomics.co...onstruction-spending

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The trade agreement by Clinton sure did increase China's construction:

https://research.stlouisfed.or.../?id=PRCNTO01CNQ661S

In what nation did Reagan kill construction, it certainly wasn't the US!

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Dire and Stanky, I don't care what chart you want to pull up out of the blue. I was a construction worker before Reagan, during Reagan and after Reagan. Construction workers were put out of work. It continued under most of Bush Sr. Construction really came back when Clinton went in. If you had a job connected to the SDI program, you made out like a fat rat.

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JT, you've proved that you are short sighted --- can't see outside your narrow focus. I suspect that construction did decrease in the area where you lived. But, obviously, not nationally. I remember the the 1980s as the time that the interstate was rebuilt in Atlanta -- massive construction and commuter delays. Many of the high rises were built during the same period.

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JT, I was there, I dodged the turns and detours around the new construction on the interstates. Or, took MARTA.  I saw the new construction along Peachtree and near Peachtree,  I saw the new construction northwest of Atlanta.

So Atlanta had some local work. Nationally, construction was way down.

In fact, if you go to a nuclear plant to work an outage as a welder, after you pass a welding test, you have to go to some class room training. The instructor brought this up, when the trainees log in, there was a 10 year period where there was almost no welders born. That represented the Reagan and Bush years. There was no jobs for them to go out on and get a start. The welder shortage is still going on. The supply hasn't caught up with demand.

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JT, I was not stating that as a fact, it was part of a question to Dire. He apparently believes that the only administrations that have ever had any impact on this countries economy was Democrats. 

Like to thank Best for this link.

"THE 1980s: (TOO) EASY MONEY FUELS A NEW building boom!

The 1980s were dynamic and a lot of fun for many real estate professionals. There was a build-up of jobs and wealth even though the decade led off with a recession, unemployment above 10% for the first time since 1940 and business failures at their highest level since 1932. The rate of economic growth was sufficient to coin the phrase "the go-go '80s." At the heart of the growth was leverage - as seductive and two-faced as ever."

More at:

http://nreionline.com/mag/real...ate_easy_money_fuels

JT insists despite graph showing that construction spending in the 1980s did not decrease, that construction was dead under Reagan and Bush.  Yet, another article stating to the contrary and my own experience in metro Atlanta area (where half the population of Georgia resides).  Democrats minds are made up, despite facts to the contrary.

Getting back to the topic of the demise of Dems, looks like in their strongholds like Baltimore and Chicago they are certainly working hard on postpartum abortion of Democrats.