djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 18, 2022 9:26:48 GMT -5
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pulmonarymd
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Post by pulmonarymd on Dec 19, 2022 7:30:53 GMT -5
You think we want to help people?
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 8:11:56 GMT -5
that's it, people? really? starving kids in the richest nation on Earth is not a discussion point?
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pulmonarymd
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Post by pulmonarymd on Dec 19, 2022 8:19:08 GMT -5
We have decided that it is not our responsibility to help these people. Out individualism is and selfishness have won out. Republicans won the tax argument and broke government. We will continue to have poor health metrics and poverty statistics because we believe that the richest country in the world cannot afford it
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 8:23:46 GMT -5
We have decided that it is not our responsibility to help these people. Out individualism is and selfishness have won out. Republicans won the tax argument and broke government. We will continue to have poor health metrics and poverty statistics because we believe that the richest country in the world cannot afford it the GOP has been trying to undermine social services by driving up the debt for decades. the idea is basically to make debt service a larger budget item to crowd out things like medicare. it is funny to watch them criticize the debt they had the largest hand in creating. actually, funny is not the right word. something closer to hideous would be better.
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scgal
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Post by scgal on Dec 19, 2022 8:49:17 GMT -5
We have decided that it is not our responsibility to help these people. Out individualism is and selfishness have won out. Republicans won the tax argument and broke government. We will continue to have poor health metrics and poverty statistics because we believe that the richest country in the world cannot afford it the GOP has been trying to undermine social services by driving up the debt for decades. the idea is basically to make debt service a larger budget item to crowd out things like medicare. it is funny to watch them criticize the debt they had the largest hand in creating. actually, funny is not the right word. something closer to hideous would be better. I'll jump in. The debt is on the hands of both parties (Ok GOP more so) and as i said in different posts it all depends on who you talk to what is item is more important to spend money on. My question is how to do help without becoming a socialist society. You would never get enough people to agree to run things like Canada (thankfully so)
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 9:01:04 GMT -5
the GOP has been trying to undermine social services by driving up the debt for decades. the idea is basically to make debt service a larger budget item to crowd out things like medicare. it is funny to watch them criticize the debt they had the largest hand in creating. actually, funny is not the right word. something closer to hideous would be better. I'll jump in. The debt is on the hands of both parties (Ok GOP more so) and as i said in different posts it all depends on who you talk to what is item is more important to spend money on. My question is how to do help without becoming a socialist society. You would never get enough people to agree to run things like Canada (thankfully so) i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 9:03:34 GMT -5
for the record, i would not even describe China as socialist at this point. i would describe it as "state capitalism"- which is really a weird hybrid. the Nordic countries and Canada are both mixed economies, as is the US. they just have different mixes. for example, we choose to spend 20% of our income privately on healthcare, whereas they spend 10% publicly and get arguably better outcomes.
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swamp
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Post by swamp on Dec 19, 2022 9:03:45 GMT -5
that's it, people? really? starving kids in the richest nation on Earth is not a discussion point? I'm not sure what to say. We have the ability to fix this issue, but we choose not to. Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is more important. Never mind that these kids don't even have boots to pull on. Horatio Alger lives on.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 9:05:50 GMT -5
that's it, people? really? starving kids in the richest nation on Earth is not a discussion point? I'm not sure what to say. We have the ability to fix this issue, but we choose not to. Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is more important. Never mind that these kids don't even have boots to pull on. Horatio Alger lives on. as does Charles Dickens
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swamp
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Post by swamp on Dec 19, 2022 9:07:11 GMT -5
I'm not sure what to say. We have the ability to fix this issue, but we choose not to. Pulling yourself up by your bootstraps is more important. Never mind that these kids don't even have boots to pull on. Horatio Alger lives on. as does Charles Dickens Then we are well overdue for a visit by 3 ghosts.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 9:07:34 GMT -5
PS- i don't know how aware of this most people are, but the US does not rank especially high in upward mobility, and hasn't for half a century. the reason is that wage earners will not take risks to "boostrap" without a social safety net. i know that is a lot for two short sentences, so have me elaborate if what i am saying is not clear. support: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Social_Mobility_Indexthe US is 27th. the Nordic countries are 1-4. Canada is 14th.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 9:09:40 GMT -5
Then we are well overdue for a visit by 3 ghosts. Scrooge just announced he is running for president. there will be no ghosts until 2025.
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swamp
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Post by swamp on Dec 19, 2022 9:14:04 GMT -5
PS- i don't know how aware of this most people are, but the US does not rank especially high in upward mobility, and hasn't for half a century. the reason is that wage earners will not take risks to "boostrap" without a social safety net. i know that is a lot for two short sentences, so have me elaborate if what i am saying is not clear. I'm pretty well aware of it, but it's been relatively recently that I learned it. I am an example of one who was able to "make it," both my parents are blue collar uneducated, but they are both very smart and were adamant their children be college educated, even if we ended up in the trades. I also benefitted from municipal health insurance, federally subsidized student loans, work study programs, and various other crap I'm not remembering. I didn't do it by myself.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 19, 2022 9:15:38 GMT -5
PS- i don't know how aware of this most people are, but the US does not rank especially high in upward mobility, and hasn't for half a century. the reason is that wage earners will not take risks to "boostrap" without a social safety net. i know that is a lot for two short sentences, so have me elaborate if what i am saying is not clear. I'm pretty well aware of it, but it's been relatively recently that I learned it. I am an example of one who was able to "make it," both my parents are blue collar uneducated, but they are both very smart and were adamant their children be college educated, even if we ended up in the trades. I also benefitted from municipal health insurance, federally subsidized student loans, work study programs, and various other crap I'm not remembering. I didn't do it by myself. very few do. particularly in the US. Trump included.
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Tennesseer
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Post by Tennesseer on Dec 19, 2022 16:35:35 GMT -5
I don't have any good answer other than more tuition-free trade schools regardless of age.
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Post by busymom on Dec 19, 2022 16:58:22 GMT -5
Ok, I'll play. Three out of four of my grandparents were immigrants. Neither of my parents could afford college, but my Dad got his education in the trades thanks to the GI bill, and Mom attended "business college". I always think it was a shame that Dad was born into a poor farm family, because he was scary-smart, and probably could have been an engineer, given the opportunity.
And THAT is where our country is failing. We have the potential to help the most intelligent people succeed, but we don't help those who were "born on the wrong side of the tracks". Other countries who compete with us, who continue to educate their youth, and meet the basic needs of their citizens, are going to continue to "outscore" us, and in time will kick our a$$ because of our unwillingness to face the basic truth that when you hold down a certain segment of the population, it will hurt us all in the long run.
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Post by lurkyloo on Dec 19, 2022 17:45:14 GMT -5
Most of my family is self made, and fortunes have gone up and down both. great grandfather immigrated on his own as a young adult, but was trained as an architect and did just fine, grandfather was brilliant with a degree in accounting but wanted to farm my grandmother’s family land. They weren’t rich as young adults but did just fine and left a significant estate behind. My father grew up having to work on the farm, in a stable but modest household, but also won a full ride scholarship to Snooty U and once again did very well for himself.
Grandmother’s family was modestly well to do in the late 1800s but lost most of it in the Depression.
My mother’s family was very blue collar and produced a lot of teachers. She did okay largely because she married well.
I have a good brain but got an unarguable boost from family values and getting my education paid for.
DH is brilliant. Born into a blue collar family, not even sure his dad finished high school, his mom was a nurse and eventually an NP. His (notable, 99th income percentile) success is all on him.
I worry that DS would be the one moving down instead of up. I think that fear, that your children will do less well than you yourself, drives a lot of reluctance to increase social mobility.
Our healthcare system is so fucked up I don’t even know where to start. US pricing pays for 99% of drug innovation (simplified, but basically true) and everyone else shits on us for being idiots and paying high prices, even though that’s precisely what allows them to coast. Pharma is willing to negotiate prices down for other countries as long as the US cash cow keeps getting milked. Somehow the drug pricing issue has leaked through to the rest of healthcare too. How do you unwind that so everyone pays a fair share? I have no clue.
No sympathy or patience for those who think kids ought to go hungry.
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Post by justme on Dec 19, 2022 23:53:18 GMT -5
I think it's a branding problem. We just need whoever figured out to rebrand plastic as vegan leather and get them in the case.
Argue that it's a way to get most men out of paying child support.
I've had many discussions regarding child support and I've always pointed out that our country has decided that child support is more important than the government providing things for children. If the government stepped up, the courts wouldn't need get as much money out of dads.
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Cheesy FL-Vol
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Post by Cheesy FL-Vol on Dec 20, 2022 4:09:20 GMT -5
I think it's a branding problem. We just need whoever figured out to rebrand plastic as vegan leather and get them in the case. Argue that it's a way to get most men out of paying child support. I've had many discussions regarding child support and I've always pointed out that our country has decided that child support is more important than the government providing things for children. If the government stepped up, the courts wouldn't need get as much money out of dads. I have a problem with this statement, but not quite sure how to verbalize it. Dads are 50% responsible for creating a child. Government is 0% responsible for creating a child. That said, children are the future and they should be provided for. I feel as a country we need to re-prioritize federal spending. Do we really need to keep feeding the war machine with trillions and trillions of dollars while we have children going without food and shelter?
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 20, 2022 6:46:52 GMT -5
Ok, I'll play. Three out of four of my grandparents were immigrants. Neither of my parents could afford college, but my Dad got his education in the trades thanks to the GI bill, and Mom attended "business college". I always think it was a shame that Dad was born into a poor farm family, because he was scary-smart, and probably could have been an engineer, given the opportunity. And THAT is where our country is failing. We have the potential to help the most intelligent people succeed, but we don't help those who were "born on the wrong side of the tracks". Other countries who compete with us, who continue to educate their youth, and meet the basic needs of their citizens, are going to continue to "outscore" us, and in time will kick our a$$ because of our unwillingness to face the basic truth that when you hold down a certain segment of the population, it will hurt us all in the long run. half of us are so lazy and privileged that we don't further ourselves. the other half are so disadvantaged that they practically can't. we are fooked.
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scgal
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Post by scgal on Dec 20, 2022 8:12:02 GMT -5
I'll jump in. The debt is on the hands of both parties (Ok GOP more so) and as i said in different posts it all depends on who you talk to what is item is more important to spend money on. My question is how to do help without becoming a socialist society. You would never get enough people to agree to run things like Canada (thankfully so) i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart. The govt role protect our country. Next
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Cheesy FL-Vol
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Post by Cheesy FL-Vol on Dec 20, 2022 8:20:19 GMT -5
i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart. The govt role protect our country. Next In your opinion, is that the sole purpose of government?
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pulmonarymd
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Post by pulmonarymd on Dec 20, 2022 9:13:18 GMT -5
i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart. The govt role protect our country. Next The founding fathers also said to provide for the general welfare. You like to ignore the parts of these documents that don't fit your world view. Compassion is not a conservative strong suit.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 20, 2022 9:18:07 GMT -5
i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart. The govt role protect our country. Next not according to the constitution. in fact, it is specifically barred from doing so by the second amendment. the combination of the preamble and the 2nd amendment suggest something that has not been done in the US since WW1. i should note that promoting the general welfare is ALSO in the preamble. next?
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 20, 2022 10:23:23 GMT -5
all of this leads me to conclude, again, that we should debate this topic. i think that there is ample consideration for liberty, security, and welfare as concerns of government in the constitution. how we prioritize these things should be a matter of continuous and contentious debate in a healthy democracy. instead, we have one party championing half of those priorities, and the other party championing the other half. that is not leading to stable or sensible or coherent government, imo.
aka- sort your shit out, America.
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Post by billisonboard on Dec 20, 2022 10:30:24 GMT -5
i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart. The govt role protect our country. Next and our country isn't just the dirt and rocks and trees. It is our citizens.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 20, 2022 10:31:16 GMT -5
i would (also) make a case that standing armies are a threat to liberty and welfare in the US. this is actually the same thing that Jefferson said prior to writing the 2nd amendment.
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djAdvocate
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Post by djAdvocate on Dec 20, 2022 10:32:32 GMT -5
The govt role protect our country. Next and our country isn't just the dirt and rocks and trees. or, if you would care to cynically stretch the argument a bit, the fortunes of the elite.
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swamp
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Post by swamp on Dec 20, 2022 10:53:47 GMT -5
i think it really means on what you mean by "socialist". effectively, every dollar a government spends is "socialism". we are, as a nation, volunteering our taxes for societal purposes. i think the problem with dismissing things like food assistance as socialism while ignoring things like military spending and debt service makes this discussion impossible. what i am saying here is that we should have a conversation about what the proper role of government is. the fact that we basically NEVER have that discussion is symptomatic of the problem. the left hates the right for putting the military first. the right hates the left for putting food, housing, and medical assistance first. there is no constructive argument to be had with the sides so far apart. The govt role protect our country. Next I am assuming you are saying that the government's role is to protect the country? Your syntax is kind of messed up, but I think that's what you are saying. If that is what you are saying, that's your opinion as to the role of our government. There are entire college majors designed around this question. I can convincingly argue several different opinions. You saying that is the role of government doesn't make it so.
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