I see where you're coming from on the issues of Federal government covering items like health care. I disagree and will probably always do so. It is a fundamental difference in philosophy that can never be reconciled.

Truthfully, I have no doubt of your compassion on a personal basis and I pretty well understand why you cannot expand that to the national level. Again, it's a fundamental difference between our philosophies.

I admit to allowing my buttons to get pushed when you simply dismiss other opinions by calling it the "Nanny State" and other derogatory terms. Then I turn around and do the same thing to you.

I'm going to try to retire from discussing some of this because it serves no further purpose. I'm not going to change your mind and you're not going to change mine. We'll each vote the way we vote regardless of what the other one thinks.

I do find discussion of some of some of the core issues as useful because it illuminates some parts of the items I may not have considered. IOW, my knowledge base can be expanded. Again, it doesn't change my philosophy.

I would find it more useful if we could all delete the derogatory terms and simply put the issues to paper and why we differ on them. To me, tables are not nearly as illuminating as philosophies. Data can be manipulated. Philosophies can't.