OK, I'm not thrilled that this article isn't [dead] already, but regardless: This is not reddit and absurdities like that comment do not contribute to the discussion.
In contrast, you did ascribe vile racist motives to more or less half the country. Indeed, so racist they'd be willing to destroy the country to fulfill their base aims. All their professed arguments (about, say, the negative effect on hiring triggered by the ACA) are simply a smokescreen. We're lucky our international readership has you to fill them in on this fundamental truth of American politics.
Is this article [dead] yet?
Meanwhile, Wal-Mart bumps 35,000 to full-time, and another 35,000 temps to permanent part-time. This besides the 55k seasonal they're about to add. So much negative effect on hiring!
And it was always racism? I don't think you're being consistent.
By the way, you also don't get to accuse me of being inconsistent when you're the one engaging in debates on HN that you argue shouldn't be here. You're a hypocrite, the most disgusting, loathsome of sub-humans.
I'm sorry it bothers you I'm having a little fun while hn slides into Eternal September. But I'm old enough to remember these same arguments 17 years ago, and believe you me, Republicans were still obstructionist jerks when the whitest white guy who ever played a saxophone was president.
It's somewhat amusing. Presumably you were not a fan of the last president's Manichean streak. Yet here you are, describing the folks your neighbors vote for in stark, black-and-white terms.
These are peoples lives, you incredible jackass. Including the lives of my family. How much more inhuman can you possibly get?
> I'm old enough to remember these same arguments 17 years ago
So am I. I also know that the current law was their counterproposal 17 years ago. But now it's the end of the world.
> describing the folks your neighbors vote for in stark, black-and-white terms
I live in rural Washington. My neighbors are every bit the insane bigots they vote for.
Similar problems happen all around the world where there is a minority government or an upper house blocking supply bills. The unusual thing with the US is the lack of constitutional mechanisms to resolve the problem before the government has to shut down. It seems odd that the writers of the constitution didn't recognise the problem.
There had only been a couple of similar republics before - there wasn't a lot of [codified] experience in the area. The Holy Roman Empire and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth had some similar power structures, for example, but I imagine that their process of obtaining and distributing funds was fairly different.
The only Constitutional mechanisms available for breaking a deadlock are Congressional elections every 2 years (entire house and 1/3rd of Senate), Presidential elections every 4 years, and the theoretical ability of 2/3rds of the states to force a Constitutional Convention to propose amendments (this has never actually happened; all Constitutional amendments have been first proposed by Congress; in either case, any amendments must be ratified by 3/4ths of states, which will never happen in the current environment where half the states would be happier destroying the country than seeing the scary black man in office for one more day).