> The interesting and important question which GP poijted out—and which you completely dodged—is where and what should be cut.
This is false on a substantive level. The parent challenged (1) the premise that federal spend should scale and with GDP and (2) whether current healthcare cost levels are justified.
It's also notable that you redacted a key part of the parent's quote. Here's the full quote:
> Given the complexity in the details, I don't think a 'serious discussion' about this is even possible in this forum. But if the question is 'do you think an effort should be made to look for things to cut', I'd say 'yes, of course.'
If this type of opinion is getting eviscerated in the comments, maybe the problem is with the opinion itself and not the forum on which it's being expressed.
If your goal is to 'eviscerate' an opinion, you shouldn't be surprised when people don't engage. If the objective of a debater is to get the other side to simply shut up, they're missing the real value of debate. They might think they've 'won the debate' by getting others to stop talking, but in reality they'll keep thinking the way they do, and just exclude you from the conversation.
You'll only learn how they really think when you see election outcomes, or which side they're standing on when it's 'ok' to dissent, and by then it's too late.
I’m sorry that you feel that shallow and uninformed opinions need to be coddled.
As an analogy, if someone comes in and says global warming isn’t happening, the goal isn’t to eviscerate that opinion. That is the outcome of the opinion being wholly inconsistent with the corpus of scientific data collected up to this point.
Bad takes get the respect they deserve. If getting hammered with difficult questions in response is too much to handle, maybe it’s time to reevaluate them. If you aren’t the type to reconsider opinions in the face of difficult questions, you’re sadly correct that an open forum for discourse probably isn’t the right place for you to be.
The stakes are too high at this point. We’re diving headfirst into a climate crisis, the U.S. government is possibly irreversibly on the path to a complete authoritarian takeover, we’re on the verge of allowing the destruction of our remaining natural heritage, and crucial functions of our government are being dismantled without any scrutiny while being egged on by the least well-informed half of the electorate. I am done pulling my punches on those who champion this shit.
> I’m sorry that you feel that shallow and uninformed opinions need to be coddled
I'm not saying any opinions need to be coddled. I'm saying that while you may interpret your interactions as 'eviscerating', I doubt if others interpret it that way.
> the goal isn’t to eviscerate that opinion. That is the outcome
Are you sure that's the outcome?
> If getting hammered with difficult questions in response is too much to handle, maybe it’s time to reevaluate them
This is false on a substantive level. The parent challenged (1) the premise that federal spend should scale and with GDP and (2) whether current healthcare cost levels are justified.
It's also notable that you redacted a key part of the parent's quote. Here's the full quote:
> Given the complexity in the details, I don't think a 'serious discussion' about this is even possible in this forum. But if the question is 'do you think an effort should be made to look for things to cut', I'd say 'yes, of course.'