American Politics

[hazeh]

It truly is frightening. I shudder to think that there are people in my country who have absolutely no problem with some/all/any of that list.

And even worse, the people who advocate for it.

 

Romney certainly doesn't act like a true American. Where's HIS birth certificate?! He's the one hell-bent on destroying this country!

[LascielsShadow]

And even worse, the people who advocate for it.

 

Romney certainly doesn't act like a true American. Where's HIS birth certificate?! He's the one hell-bent on destroying this country!

Exactly. I don't know how anyone can, in good conscience, advocate such things.

 

No, he doesn't. It's kind of terrifying how much at odds he and the current crop of GOP politicians in power are with what the US is supposed to be about.

 

I don't think he has one. Do they issue birth certificates for robots? (Sorry. I couldn't help it.)

Edited September 5, 2012 by LascielsShadow

[Alpha1]

I just didn't know where you stood on that issue so I had to ask. I can't see inside your head you know. o-o'

 

Didn't my post imply that, though? I mean, the quote from the article was specifically addressing people who thought we were becoming more dependent on these programs. It gave several reasons for the trend.

 

Similarly, Republicans like to blame Obama on the amount of people on food stamps, but that's really because a lot more people qualified for the program after the financial crisis.

 

It can be annoying too when the discussion is about the debt, since it would have happened under anyone's watch. Automatic stabilizers + loss of revenue (started in Bush's term after financial crisis) = debt

 

Where's HIS birth certificate?!

 

It's on the top of his car.

 

Obama has a good sense of humor.

 

 

[lightbird]

The birth certificate's here- a quick google search brings it up. http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/fi...e-long-form.pdf

On Obama's website you can buy a mug with his birth certificate printed on it. Gotta love the sense of humour.

 

Large image

There's really no way to make the conspiracy about President Obama's birth certificate completely go away, so we might as well laugh at it -- and make sure as many people as possible are in on the joke

[Kestra15]

I don't have a big issue with immigrants. The only issue I have is with the illegal ones. They come here take the jobs people would love to get just because companies want to save some money. My own aunt worked with a guy who had to change his name and everything a couple times if I recall correctly. That to me is wrong.

See, this is something we have in the UK too - or at least, an argument put forward by anti-immigration persons in the UK. "Bloody foreign workers coming over here, stealing out jobs..." But the thing is, the jobs they steal are (literally) the crap ones; cleaners, road sweepers, toilet attendants, binmen, all the glamorous, undesirable jobs. And when the person arguing we should get rid of them all is sitting around on benefits for years on end and will refuse to even apply for the jobs that have been 'stolen' from them because they feel such jobs are 'beneath them,' it kinda detracts from the argument.

 

This is not to say I support illegal immigration - I don't. However, immigrant work-forces are the back-bone of many Western societies, such as America, England and Germany, and this continual approach of 'Britain for the British' or 'America for the Americans' is a horrendous mistake, and while it would be fantastic to get rid of illegal immigrants I think a sudden removal of them from society would have a negative knock-on effect.

Since Obama has been in office, the debt is now 5.4 trillion in the 4yrs he has been in office, twice as much as when Bush was in office.

As pointed out before, Obama took over at the beginning of a recession while your country was in two wars - of course the debt is going to have increased over his time in office. It would have doubled regardless of who was in office. Or did you not bother to read my previous post on how the whole world is economically shafted? Probably not, by the looks of things.

Your utility bills are going to sky rocket also. This is due to another of his "green programs".

Again, global recession, scarcity of resources (you realise the world is supposedly due to run out of fossil fuels in the next 100yrs?), increase in global price of resources...the UK is about to see a 9% increase in their energy and gas bills as well, because guess what? The price of fossil fuels and energy based off them is increasing! So no, it's not Obama going out and personally increasing the price of every person's gas and electricity.

Another problem I have, why will Obama not show his birth certificate? The real birth certificate. Why could Obama's illeagal family stay, and not get deported, lol.

*facepalm* I was the third gunman on the grassy knoll.

Let me tell you something about food stamps and welfare. It is a joke the people who are on welfare. They keep on having babies so they get the food stamps and welfare. They DO NOT WANT TO WORK. This system is so abused it is not funny.

Again, how narrow you are. I spent a few months on benefits here in the UK, and I am personally offended at how you stereotype myself and a number of my friends and family. I didn't sit around popping out babies and fiddling the system; I applied literally every day to at least one new job, I was doing 30 - 40 hrs a week voluntary work split between the three voluntary roles I had, I continued with my studies (on top of the Masters in Mathematics with Honours that I already had)...

 

But of course, you refuse to see or accept that. Your continual automatic assumption that anyone on benefits is some kind of layabout is frankly disgusting and immature.

 

Some of you feel your young age is not a factor, but it is, that you are not aware of some of the things I post about

No, but the fact that my IQ is probably half again yours and that fact that I am aware there is more than one country in this world is probably a bigger deciding factor than age.

 

And that comment about IQ wasn't me saying you're stupid. It's just that my IQ is some 60 points higher than the US average.

Edited September 5, 2012 by Kestra15

[Rosedamai]

Obama has a good sense of humor.

That he does. He gave us this:

 

 

 

See, this is something we have in the UK too - or at least, an argument put forward by anti-immigration persons in the UK. "Bloody foreign workers coming over here, stealing out jobs..." But the thing is, the jobs they steal are (literally) the crap ones; cleaners, road sweepers, toilet attendants, binmen, all the glamorous, undesirable jobs. And when the person arguing we should get rid of them all is sitting around on benefits for years on end and will refuse to even apply for the jobs that have been 'stolen' from them because they feel such jobs are 'beneath them,' it kinda detracts from the argument.

Happens here in South Korea as well, but we haven't had many foreign people living here, and we have a history of continually being oppressed, which births a strong nationalistic sentiment to counter it, so it goes a bit more extreme than that. There was this...Chinese person who was apparently an illegal immigrant and had mutilated and partially eaten a woman, and every unsavory journalist and their mother were talking about how the "Chinese" had a "Cannibal human meat trade" in Korea. Of course, people with at least two brain cells sighed and rolled their eyes.

 

So no, it's not Obama going out and personally increasing the price of every person's gas and electricity.

I had this funny image of Obama going from door to door like Santa Claus and magically increasing every person's gas and electricity bills... Edited September 5, 2012 by ylangylang

[Alpha1]

As pointed out before, Obama took over at the beginning of a recession while your country was in two wars - of course the debt is going to have increased over his time in office. It would have doubled regardless of who was in office. Or did you not bother to read my previous post on how the whole world is economically shafted? Probably not, by the looks of things.

 

 

This doesn't show intragovernmental debt, but as you can see, those Bush tax cuts are costly.

 

Again, global recession, scarcity of resources (you realise the world is due to run out of fossil fuels in the next 50yrs?), increase in global price of resources...the UK is about to see a 9% increase in their energy and gas bills as well, because guess what? The price of fossil fuels and energy based off them is increasing! So no, it's not Obama going out and personally increasing the price of every person's gas and electricity.

 

No, it's not. There's a shale gas revolution going on over here. Just several years ago these would have been unconventional sources, but with new techniques, reserves around the world have increased.

[Kestra15]

No, it's not. There's a shale gas revolution going on over here. Just several years ago these would have been unconventional sources, but with new techniques, reserves around the world have increased.

Even factoring in these new techniques we're still in trouble, and best-end estimates still put a 50yr life-span on oil (coal and gas have their life-span extended by these new techniques, certainly). The other thing with these projections is they have to by nature be conservative; even though many governments are trying to invest in new fuel sources and reduce a country's percentage reliance on fossil fuels, the fuel consumption per country is continually increasing, and that increase is greater than the decrease in reliance. Because accurate predictions on a country's individual consumption rate is difficult, the more 'worst case scenarios' are - rather sensibly - being taken.

 

This is especially relevant when you consider the 'industrial revolutions' of many of the poorer countries, those whose industries are expanding at a significant rate especially in comparison to more stable Western economies such as the US and the UK. Given that the rate of fossil fuel consumption since the 1850s has been exponential (and I do mean that in the mathematical term), it's reasonable to assume such a trend will continue as more countries expand in their industrialisation.

 

The increase in fuel prices are a combination of factors; not just the standard rate of inflation, but the significant inflation in fossil fuels to the consumers, and the taxation on power companies from the governments as they encourage these companies to investigate greener resources - which means the companies are spending a lot more than they used to, especially because at the moment greener resources are more costly (we've had a century and more in order to refine our use of fossil fuels, which we understand to a great extent, whereas the 'green revolution' is relatively young and unknown). There is also the fact that since green technology is still a new thing it is actually more expensive per unit of power produced because of the cost of R&D, testing, etc.

[Rosedamai]

Sorry for being off topic, but no, seriously Republicans, you expect people to vote for you when you have signs like this?

 

 

Edited September 5, 2012 by ylangylang

[Kestra15]

Sorry for being off topic, but no, seriously Republicans, you expect people to vote for you when you have signs like this?

 

 

This is the sad thing - people vote for that. I'm looking at you, extremist Bible-belt Christians.

[Rosedamai]

This is the sad thing - people vote for that. I'm looking at you, extremist Bible-belt Christians.

Okay, I was just searching stuff up generally on American politics, and I found-I swear to God-mountains of similar rhetoric, I'm wondering if I should read it or not because some of it is triggering and just disgusts me. I think I'll post some on the Abortion thread.

 

Such as:

 

http://articles.nydailynews.com/2012-04-28...y-john-liautaud

Mitt Romney has some simple advice for students who want to start their own business: Just borrow money from your parents.

Are you freaking kidding me? Not everyone has parents that are that rich.

 

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09...-of-better-off/

While correct, some of Mr. Ryan’s numbers seemed cherry-picked to paint the worst possible picture and to ignore the argument by Democrats that Mr. Obama inherited a disastrous economy that continued to deteriorate during much of his first year, but that since then has turned around and slowly improved.

 

It is true that unemployment in North Carolina is higher than the national average. It is also true that the rate peaked at 11.4 percent in January and February 2010 and has been dropping since then.

 

Mr. Ryan also cited bankruptcy numbers to make the point that failing businesses mean fewer jobs. “In 1980 under Jimmy Carter, 330,000 businesses filed for bankruptcy,” he said. “Last year, under President Obama’s failed leadership, 1.4 million businesses filed for bankruptcy.”

 

But he appeared to conflate business bankruptcies and much more numerous personal bankruptcies. Of the 331,264 bankruptcies in 1980, only 43,694 were for businesses, according to the American Bankruptcy Institute.

 

Of the 1,410,653 total bankruptcy filings last year, 47,806 were business bankruptcies, according to the institute. And, again, the numbers are falling. In 2009, there were 60,837 business bankruptcies. In July, the latest month with complete statistics, business bankruptcies were 22 percent lower than a year earlier, and personal bankruptcies were down 11 percent.

So...it seems that many Republicans fears about the economy are not justified.

 

http://www.buzzfeed.com/zekejmiller/north-...-to-make-aborti

Rick Berg, North Dakota's at-large congressman and a candidate for Senate, voted to criminalize abortion in the state as a Class AA felony, including in the case of rape or incest.

You have these weirdos on your team, Republicans. Please do something about them.

 

http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/rese...sgender-voters/

Nine states’ voter ID laws may create substantial barriers to voting and possible disenfranchisement for over 25,000 transgender voters this November.

And you've passed voter laws that effectively marginalized a group of people

 

http://www.forbes.com/sites/rickungar/2012...s-barack-obama/

Edited September 5, 2012 by ylangylang

[Fuzzbucket]

Oh no it takes a lot of intelligence to cheat, scandal and bribe money out of others!

 

I'm sorry but Donald Trump is only intelligent when it comes to any deals with money. Anyone who'd believe him I seriously worry about. Look at all the money this guy has. No better than anyone in the Senate, Congress or any political power. They all have money from somewhere and most of it is inherited.

And only when they benefit HIM.

 

As for the crap about Obama's birth certificate - words fail me. Luckily for y'all

General knowledge of how an economy works and what's practical/not applies to both... There's a lot of similarities actually.

In the UK they thought it might be smart to bring in a business manage with enormous success running supermarkets to run a hospital with a huge debt. He was all gung ho Mr FixIt.

 

He left after 6 months; saying you cannot run a hospital like a business; it cannot be about shareholders and profit; it's about people and their health, and they are too important to try and make money out of.

 

Same goes for a country.

We have oil here in the USA.

Again, Obama the DICTATOR

Obama the SOCIALIST

 

No President has ever had a track record like Obama's. If he gets elected this country is doomed. This is insanity! Obama just pulled another one of his stunts on the American people while they were watching the hurrican or RNC. He does not care how bad he hurts our people. It is all part of his scheme to destroy this country. Your utility bills are going to sky rocket also. This is due to another of his "green programs".

You know - increasingly I begin to realise how very afraid you are. Only fear brings in the inability to see any other point of view but your own. And seeing someone the US people elected as a dictator beggars belief.

 

You remind me of my unhappy and afraid sister in law. My sympathy.

 

As to oil - we NEED to find an alternative. We would not have this huge energy problem if - MANY YEARS AGO - the auto industry hadn't managed to persuade the then US government to block the development of electric cards because it would affect their pockets. Only now is their development taking off - possibly too late.

 

People go to tan, and he sticks his nose in that, I am talking about personal things. People like their big vehicles here and many more things like the way we eat. Obama needs to mind his own household affairs.

Cutting emissions helps everyone in the world (but of course, only the people of the US seem to matter to you...)

 

As for tanning - you don't think (assuming you MEAN tanning parlours) that there should be no legislation against the positively dangerous ? Those places result in skin cancer. But if THEY should be free for us all to use, in the interest of personal freedom, then please (and this I mean) get on and legalise drugs which will do more than ANYTHING to put an end to drug wars and drug related crime - and yes, sell it in state outlets and use the taxes raised for something worth doing like schools, roads and - HEALTHCARE !

 

And of course, everything else should be freely legal too - including abortion, immigration, you name it. You can't have freedom for what YOU want and not for what anyone else wants if you don't happen to like it (I VALUE immigration, myself, and loathe controls.)

[Alpha1]

Even factoring in these new techniques we're still in trouble, and best-end estimates still put a 50yr life-span on oil (coal and gas have their life-span extended by these new techniques, certainly). The other thing with these projections is they have to by nature be conservative; even though many governments are trying to invest in new fuel sources and reduce a country's percentage reliance on fossil fuels, the fuel consumption per country is continually increasing, and that increase is greater than the decrease in reliance. Because accurate predictions on a country's individual consumption rate is difficult, the more 'worst case scenarios' are - rather sensibly - being taken.

 

This is especially relevant when you consider the 'industrial revolutions' of many of the poorer countries, those whose industries are expanding at a significant rate especially in comparison to more stable Western economies such as the US and the UK.  Given that the rate of fossil fuel consumption since the 1850s has been exponential (and I do mean that in the mathematical term), it's reasonable to assume such a trend will continue as more countries expand in their industrialisation.

 

The increase in fuel prices are a combination of factors; not just the standard rate of inflation, but the significant inflation in fossil fuels to the consumers, and the taxation on power companies from the governments as they encourage these companies to investigate greener resources - which means the companies are spending a lot more than they used to, especially because at the moment greener resources are more costly (we've had a century and more in order to refine our use of fossil fuels, which we understand to a great extent, whereas the 'green revolution' is relatively young and unknown). There is also the fact that since green technology is still a new thing it is actually more expensive per unit of power produced because of the cost of R&D, testing, etc.

 

Edit: Proven oil reserves is about 65 years according to Wikipedia.

 

I should have also mentioned oil shale, but the natural gas from shale can be used to at least convert the big movers to LNG.

 

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/e...boom/52053236/1

 

"It's the new, new thing," Yergin, the energy historian, says of tight oil. He says its U.S. production could skyrocket to 2.9 million barrels per day by 2020. North Dakota, which accounts for the vast majority of this oil, produced 488,066 barrels per day in October 2011, up from 90,196 in January 2005, according to the state's Department of Mineral Resources.

 

Biofuels from algae will also probably play a significant factor in the future.

 

 

This is misleading. However, the Republicans are no deficit hawks!

Edited September 5, 2012 by Alpha1

[Rosedamai]

 

This is misleading. However, the Republicans are no deficit hawks!

Well, it does say in the link that-

So, how do the actual Obama annual budgets look?

 

Courtesy of Marketwatch-

 

In fiscal 2010 (the first Obama budget) spending fell 1.8% to $3.46 trillion.

In fiscal 2011, spending rose 4.3% to $3.60 trillion.

In fiscal 2012, spending is set to rise 0.7% to $3.63 trillion, according to the Congressional Budget Office’s estimate of the budget that was agreed to last August.

Finally in fiscal 2013 — the final budget of Obama’s term — spending is scheduled to fall 1.3% to $3.58 trillion. Read the CBO’s latest budget outlook.

 

But anyways, I agree that yeah, Republicans aren't magic unicorns who can make the economy all better.

[Alpha1]

Well, it does say in the link that-

 

 

"Fact Check: Obama’s thrifty spending claim uses some creative accounting

 

Published May 27, 2012

 

Associated Press

 

[...]

 

"The problem with that rosy claim is that the Wall Street bailout is part of the calculation. The bailout ballooned the 2009 budget just before Obama took office, making Obama’s 2010 results look smaller in comparison. And as almost $150 billion of the bailout was paid back during Obama’s watch, the analysis counted them as government spending cuts.[...]"

[philpot123]

Looks like campaign rhetoric sure works on making people think the candidates are contemptible.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Do I really look like the kind of person that buys into campaign rhetoric? ;P I'm very fond of independent research. Even conservative leaning fact checkers are starting to realize that a lot of the stuff Romney spouts is utter garbage. Snarky commercials did not help me arrive at my political beliefs.

 

People pay more taxes than just the federal income tax. Payroll taxes, excise taxes, state sales tax, property tax, and state income tax. The poor also are probably paying rent for something they’ll never have a stake in and this section of the population pays more for the same item or service via credit. Although the recession has lessened it, we have a huge gap between the rich and poor not seen since 1920's. After all, the rich can easily make more off of the money they make by speculating on land and investing in stock. Fun fact: In 1960, the CEO-to-President pay ratio was 2-to-1. In recent years, it has been 40+-to-1. "The explosion in executive pay has become controversial, criticized by not only leftists but conservative establishmentarians such as Ben Bernanke[5] Peter Drucker, and John Bogle[8][9]" "It's a very bad development. It's creating two societies." -- Bernanke http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/1...t-isnt-diverse/ "A large part of the rising share of the top 1 — about 60 percent, according to the Piketty-Saez data — is actually attributable to the top 0.1 percent." These people aren’t diverse. If you look at the top 0.1%, you'll find the majority are lawyers, non-finance execs, financial professions, and in real estate. Where are the tech entrepreneurs?

 

 

I'm aware there are other taxes. What's your point? If you factor those in as well, the top income bracket is paying even MORE than others.

 

I also fail to understand why people always point out a "large gap between the rich and the poor" as a bad thing. It's only a bad thing if you have fantasies of an egalitarian society.

 

Paul wants to target abortion, homosexuality, and religion via disregarding the 14th Amendment’s protections. http://paul.senate.gov/?p=issue&id=3 “I would strongly support legislation restricting federal courts from hearing cases like Roe v. Wade. Such legislation would only require a majority vote, making it more likely to pass than a pro-life constitutional amendment.”

 

Ah, sir, you just linked to RAND Paul, who holds to much less libertarian ideals than his father. RON Paul is not in favor of the national government passing blanket legislation on those issues.

[Rosedamai]

I also fail to understand why people always point out a "large gap between the rich and the poor" as a bad thing. It's only a bad thing if you have fantasies of an egalitarian society.

It usually means that social mobility is being compromised. Of course there will always be a gap between the poor and the rich-but usually the sign of the gap widening too much could imply lots of things, such as inequality of opportunity, inequality of outcome, and so on. This leads to the decrease of civic engagement, less levels of trust among society members, decreased social capital, etc. Which leads to higher crime rates and civic unrest, which a well-functioning society does not need. Most revolutions happened precisely because of, or large part of it was, the problems with the income gap.

Edited September 5, 2012 by ylangylang

[philpot123]

As for tanning - you don't think (assuming you MEAN tanning parlours) that there should be no legislation against the positively dangerous ? Those places result in skin cancer. But if THEY should be free for us all to use, in the interest of personal freedom, then please (and this I mean) get on and legalise drugs which will do more than ANYTHING to put an end to drug wars and drug related crime - and yes, sell it in state outlets and use the taxes raised for something worth doing like schools, roads and - HEALTHCARE !

 

Missed this on my skim-through. YAY FOR BASE LIBERTARIANISM! Get the national government out of things like that it shouldn't be involved in universally. No silly legislation about tanning parlors. Drugs? Please. The war on drugs is the worst thing to happen since prohibition. The fact that people can get life sentences for growing what USED to be a common, naturally occurring plant boggles my mind. I may not wholeheartedly support the recreational use of drugs, but my gosh they shouldn't be illegal. The fact that the government can tell us what we can and can't put into our bodies should scare us a little bit. So I totally agree with you on that count.

 

It usually means that social mobility is being compromised. Of course there will always be a gap between the poor and the rich-but usually the sign of the gap widening too much could imply lots of things, such as inequality of opportunity, inequality of outcome, and so on. This leads to the decrease of civic engagement, less levels of trust among society members, decreased social capital, etc. Which leads to higher crime rates and civic unrest, which a well-functioning society does not need. Most revolutions happened precisely because of, or large part of it was, the problems with the income gap.

 

Could it not also be a sign that our current methods of addressing "poverty" are ineffective?

[Rosedamai]

Could it not also be a sign that our current methods of addressing "poverty" are ineffective?

That too, which means wasted tax, which means we need a more efficient and thorough social welfare system.

[brairtrainer]

That too, which means wasted tax, which means we need a more efficient and thorough social welfare system.

^this

[Fuzzbucket]

It usually means that social mobility is being compromised. Of course there will always be a gap between the poor and the rich-but usually the sign of the gap widening too much could imply lots of things, such as inequality of opportunity, inequality of outcome, and so on. This leads to the decrease of civic engagement, less levels of trust among society members, decreased social capital, etc. Which leads to higher crime rates and civic unrest, which a well-functioning society does not need. Most revolutions happened precisely because of, or large part of it was, the problems with the income gap.

Yes it could mean that our methods of addressing poverty are ineffective. They certainly are, IMHO.

 

But there is a huge amount of evidence which I haven't the time to pull just now as I have a funeral to deal with, showing that the happiest societies are those where the gap between rich and poor is the smallest. As far as I'm concerned that's a good enough reason to minimise the gap ! But even if it weren't - since money buys power these days, and those IN power have no idea what it is like NOT to have money, and come up with bright ideas like "well, if you don't like where you live, move" - how exactly when you cannot even afford public transport to the store, never mind the cost of actually moving - and maybe one of you has a crap paying job, but if the one looking for work is to move, the one with the crap pay would have to give that up and risk both of them being jobless...

 

And don't get me started on "poor diet is a matter of choice" when supermarkets in poor areas stock the worst food and charge more than those in richer areas, and there is also the small matter of the expense of cooking nice healthy stuff. Politicians have no idea what it is like when you can't actually afford the electricity to use your oven.

 

My point being that politicians who have no experience of living on the breadline are not the best people to try and work out what to do about it - but then they helpfully withdraw funding from the agencies that are actually getting somewhere.

[prairiecrow]

Could it not also be a sign that our current methods of addressing "poverty" are ineffective?

Why the quotation marks around "poverty", as if it isn't real?

 

Poverty isn't something that people play at to get free food stamps. It's excruciatingly real and causes tremendous suffering to millions of people. Frankly I find those quotation marks profoundly insulting to those who struggle to keep themselves and their families afloat every day; it's as if you're erasing their experiences, or trying to anyway.

[Fuzzbucket]

Why the quotation marks around "poverty", as if it isn't real?

 

Poverty isn't something that people play at to get free food stamps. It's excruciatingly real and causes tremendous suffering to millions of people. Frankly I find those quotation marks profoundly insulting to those who struggle to keep themselves and their families afloat every day; it's as if you're erasing their experiences, or trying to anyway.

Good point.

[Vhale]

I am really fed up with the extremism on the right in regards to other people's rights. Really fed up. But, I'm not overly trusting of the Dems. I really hate that the NDAA went through. I am very curious to see if their speeches at the DNC this week are as full of hogwash as the RNC was. To a degree, the guantlet has been thrown down. How bad the lies were, was pointed out all over. Can the other side actually try to be honest in reply to it?

 

Only time will tell. But, the point of a living wage has to be made. What the US has, is NOT sustainable. Texas, sadly, is probably going to be the poster child for this. Once again, Perry, gave a big company, Apple, 25 million to build here. Really, the company that had 96 billion and just didn't know what to do with it, had to be bribed for 25 million when we can't even pay for our states own health care services. Citation Though I guess it's not as bad as Walmart, who made 4th quarter profits of 4 billion, yet can't afford to give it's workers benefits or even water in their 115 degree warehouses in California. Citation Or they could be like the coal workers that were forced to go to Romney's picture op,donate to his compaign, and had a day's pay taken for it. Citation Best line from the article? “There were no workers that were forced to attend the event,” Moore said. “We had managers that communicated to our work force that the attendance at the Romney event was mandatory, but no one was forced to attend the event. We had a pre-registration list. And employees were asked to put their names on a pre-registration list because they could not get into the event unless they were pre-registered and had a name tag to enter the premises.”

 

[philpot123]

That too, which means wasted tax, which means we need a more efficient and thorough social welfare system.

So, government isn't working so we need more government?

 

 

 

Why the quotation marks around "poverty", as if it isn't real? Poverty isn't something that people play at to get free food stamps. It's excruciatingly real and causes tremendous suffering to millions of people. Frankly I find those quotation marks profoundly insulting to those who struggle to keep themselves and their families afloat every day; it's as if you're erasing their experiences, or trying to anyway.

 

I put quotation marks around it because different people have very different ideas of what poverty means. Not that I was saying it isn't a real problem. But where not so long ago, owning one or more cars and a TV set was considered somewhat of a luxury, now even some people who are considered below the "poverty" line own those things. That is not to say that they don't have a quantifiable need, but just that relative to past cultural norms and most countries around the globe, even most of those who receive welfare in our nation are very well off.

 

I also question the effectiveness of our welfare system sometimes when I have observed fathers who cannot "afford" to care for their children and receive welfare benefits who also happen to drive around on $3k rims with a $6k stereo. This is not to say that this is TYPICAL. This is not to say that it's in any way representative of welfare recipients as a whole. My family received welfare for a short time after my father's irresponsibility cost him his job and my mother was left with no way to care for us. I'm just saying that there ARE problems with the system that I have seen and can attest to. I also have a close family friend who taught in a public school in a low-income area of some major city, I can't remember which one. Her experience was that these young women were conditioned to believe that this was simply how life was. Have a child, receive a check. She even remembers one very young girl actually saying to her when she (my friend) was pregnant, "Oh Mrs. H! You can get your check now!" Again, I'm not trying to say that this is representative of the system as a whole, or in any way a stereotype of the people who receive welfare. Our welfare system meets legitimate needs, and it does fantastic things for people trying to get back on their feet. But there are abuses to the system, and there are perpetual welfare recipients who don't attempt to improve their station because they're surviving on a government check, there are people who are receiving disability checks who are FAR from disabled (my father is one of them), etc. So yes, I recognize that poverty is a problem, but I question the effectiveness of our current method of addressing it.