But of course we can't have any government spending to shore up our infrastructure, now, can we. It wouldn't be "conservative." /snark

I agree!
I drove around all day today and asked "hey are you one of Christie's rich friends and do you have water?" most of them said "yes" and then gave a hearty laugh

Dan – If government control is better, then why are American Jails so dangerous, costly, and ineffective? After all, that is total government control.

BTW, when you worked as a loan office at a used car dealer how many times did you secure a loan for say 4%, then turn around and tell the customer you got him a great deal at 9%? Also, how much of that fluff did you stick in your pocket, and if a customer defaulted on their loan downstream, did anyone come back to you and take your commission for that loan away? Nahhhh, didn’t think so!

Actually, I wanted to reply to Mr. Campbell, but there is no 'reply' button. American jails are not under total government control. The Corrections Corporation of America has many of them and the number is growing. There was recently a scandal in PA where two state judges were sentencing people to very harsh, long terms in the privately run prison. The judges were then getting monetary kick-backs. The scandal was exposed, but the prison corp continues running the prison.

The second part of the answer given by Mr. Campbell seems to be a pointless non-sequiter. I do not see how it has any relation to the original answer.

First I was never a loan officer for a car dealership. Second people A. don't have to buy a car, B. have the right to shop around for a better deal. How long can you go without water ? Much of the water these for profit companies control was provided because the Government built Dams and drilled wells. unfortunately those public resources were sold by local Governments to private sector companies. Now the people have to pay more and get worse service.

Go to the store and buy the water.

You are dead wrong!

>> Tea Party, Libertarian, whatever. It is all pretty much the same.

Democrats, Marxists, Commies, murderers, rapists, whatever. It is all pretty much the same. Right, Dan?

Dan, if you don't know the difference between Libertarians and Tea Party, you are not competent enough to post on a political forum. You are also clearly unable to use the "Reply" button kindly provided by Patch. I'm worried for your mental health, dude.

If you can't tell the difference b/w a Librarian and a Libertarian, you definitely shouldn't be posting. And I am sure the Librarians of the world appreciate being called frauds by your ignorant self.

sir, can you provide any facts to back that up? can you link to any official government statistics that show those numbers? also, just fyi, his latest plan is to hold taxes steady for 98% of americans.

rtrux I believe the information behind the $14 billion Sir was referring to can be found here: http://www2.wspa.com/news/2012/jul/10/billions-dollars-overpaid-unemployment-money-ar-4106080/ It appears that they were not necessarily eligible, but over paid for various reasons. Just another waste of our tax money from Nobama.

according to the reports, a large part of the fault and mispayment comes from the states, not the federal government. also, it says "The overpayment typically results from an administrative error made either by the government, the employer, the worker or a combination of the three."

while the federal government can certainly always get better at its job, when viewed objectively it's unfair to blame president obama for screw ups on the state level, and for errors made by the employer and worker.

Can't you people ever be honest about anything? $3.5 trillion of the socalled Obama overspending came from the Bush tax cuts and two wars that were handed to him. There is no doubt that he did pull us back from the brink with the stimulus and saved the American Auto industry which is more competive and profitable today. The $14 billion even if true, which I doubt, is about Americans cheating America. What did you want him to do, go door to door himself and check on these people? Maddoff stole $50 Billion himself and under Bush we lost that much in a couple of Months in Iraq, stolen by crooked leaders and American Contractors.

When it comes to raising or lowering taxes, liberals seem to suggest that we should be grateful for whatever the government let's us keep of our earnings, and that even legal efforts to hang on to our earnings are "cheating America".

More ignorance, Madoff never stole $50bn for himself. You clearly have no clue what the hell Madoff was up to if you think he took $50bn for himself. Go read a paper and get a clue already. Stop just pulling made up facts out of thin air.

Were you people raised to post a constant stream of anonymous insults. What kind of upbringing causes a person the throw anonymous insults from a closet in which they are hiding.

tom, i know a lot of liberals and none of them have ever said anything like what you suggest. i'm a democrat and believe in smaller and more efficiently run government, but i believe in government programs that deliver value. i also like having a national highway system, airports, clear drinking water, police/fire and military protection, etc. your comment is playing to stereotypes and strawmen.

OK, rtrux, fair enough. I don't like strawman arguments either.

Dan, what exactly do you mean by Americans cheating America? It seems to suggest that we should be grateful for whatever the government let's us keep of our earnings ... as opposed to letting the government redistribute it through social engineering, incompetence or incompetent social engineering. For example, lately Sen. Menendez thinks Obamacare is wonderful because it will lower the deficit by $1 trillion over twenty years. Meanwhile, the Gross Federal Debt has risen $6 trillion in only the last four years!

And with regard to anonymity, there is a long, respected tradition of the use of pen names. See the Wikipedia article. Personally, I don't need to know the full, legal name of the person I'm conversing with, let alone see their mug.

thanks, tom. didn't mean to be a pain, i think we agree we can all have a spirited but reasonable discussion on the issues.

Tom, My comments about Americans cheating America was in response to the Comment about $14 billion paid out in illegal unemployment claims. Yes it is the Goverment that paid them but it is people that file and collect them. The poster implied that it was somehow the fault of the Obama Administration that these claims were paid. They are also administered by State Government.
The main issue I have with anonymous posting is that people post things that are vile and would not say if they have to post their names. redrider is a classic example of that. I still believe that if you feel you position or point is worth something then put you name to it. No one is writing Commonsense or the federalist papers here.

If you are going to call me out by name, the least you could do is acknowledge that you were dead wrong when you claimed LIBRARIANS HATE THE GOVERNMENT and when you claimed MADOFF STOLE $50BN HIMSELF. Yes, I am yelling b/c you are clueless and you make stuff up or just say things that are completely incorrect yet cry victim when people call you out on being wrong. So do us all a favor and learn the difference b/w a Libertarian and a Librarian. When you are done w/ that, go read up on Ponzi schemes, fake profits and Madoff. You will find if you a little reading that the net amount of the fraud was under $20bn and almost none of that made it to Madoff or his employees. The money was wheeled out to earlier investors just like in any other Ponzi scheme. You might also realize after reading those reports that fake profits can't be stolen b/c they never existed to begin with and that Madoff and his family's wealth when it was seized was in the tens of millions of dollars and not in the tens of billions of dollars. But why let a few facts get in the way of your rants, right Dan?

sir, that accusation is bogus, as i noted above...here's my comment again:

according to the reports, a large part of the fault and mispayment comes from the states, not the federal government. also, it says "The overpayment typically results from an administrative error made either by the government, the employer, the worker or a combination of the three."

while the federal government can certainly always get better at its job, when viewed objectively it's unfair to blame president obama for screw ups on the state level, and for errors made by the employer and worker.

and you can't make up your own rules for how questions can be answered fairly. the report says a large part of the mismanagement happens on the state level, and that a degree of fault is also employers and workers who make errors on forms. in other words, an objective view of the situation is that states, workers and employers are largely at fault, the federal government much less so.

i realize this doesn't conform to your narrative and that you will dismiss it anyway, but those are the facts.