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I'm betting he's never had his limbs mangled in industrial equipment or worked 16 hours a day starting from the age of 6 either. But most people don't need to experience those things for themselves to know they're not good.
Like a lot of people who long for the past, you gloss over the really crappy parts, and there were a lot of them. Unless you were white, straight, male and well off, America in the not-too-distant past could be a pretty lousy place to live.
Did I gloss over them? No, did they happen, and did they really really really really really suck...Yeah..
Was everything crappy, God know..I mean the Apollo mission...God how great was that...It sucked that we gave up and wasted trillions on the war on poverty/The Great Society Scam....God Damn It Waste!
Well to be honest if you are wealthy and good looking regardless of race in anytime or place you are in for a great life...
Did I gloss over them? No, did they happen, and did they really really really really really suck...Yeah..
Well to be honest if you are wealthy and good looking regardless of race in anytime or place you are in for a great life...
You might want to hold on that. In the 1950s, even wealthy Black people were often mistreated, ranging from being prohibited from living in certain areas to be refused service in some areas.
I look to the future, I don't concentrate on the past. I firmly believe that if you don't have any hope, then you have nothing. I don't mean 'hope' in a religious sense BTW. Just hope in general. If you think something is wrong, try and change it for the better. Fear mongering only breeds more fear mongering.
Many people on this board think we are living in desparate times, but if things were really that bad, so many people in the world would not want to come here.
HOPE is simply desire for a certain thing to happen. No action required. And it is not something to run a campaign on. You can't live on hope.
Yeah had vastly different needs for labor and work in 1850 then we do today.
We also did not have a welfare system and politician that use race and class warfare to get elected...
We also did not have Islamic and Narco terrorism in 1850.
Nah, we just had that little inconvenience known as slavery.
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We had people coming here and learning English because we would not serve them in any other language, now?
People came here from Europe and continued to speak their language. Often, in places all over the country, their descendants continue to do so. I don't see anything wrong with that.
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We had people that tossed off the culture and political values of their home lands that made it so unlivable that it made them flee...Now they are just replicating the same collectivist failures in this nation, where can we run to?
You can try to make this country actually live up to its ideals.......or you can move to outer space. Good luck!
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I hate to break it to you and people like you but a open border in 21st Century does not and will not work, how many people have to suffer with a lowers standard of living, and be victims of violent criminals who are here in this nation illegally if and when people like you wake up and understand this..
Hey you are right in that regard, but why not have America have the best tax system?
Why not have a flat/fair tax and get rid of the cooperate income tax with harms and prevents business from either starting in or moving to this nation?
I'm betting he's never had his limbs mangled in industrial equipment or worked 16 hours a day starting from the age of 6 either. But most people don't need to experience those things for themselves to know they're not good.
Like a lot of people who long for the past, you gloss over the really crappy parts, and there were a lot of them. Unless you were white, straight, male and well off, America in the not-too-distant past could be a pretty lousy place to live.
That's the usual progressive excuse. It's okay that they have racked up trillions of dollars in debt, try to control how much salt and soda we can have, spend hundreds of billions of dollars paying welfare to the people who don't have jobs because their taxes and regulations forced those jobs overseas, run a declining education system, have turned stable families into a 50% illegitimacy rate, have jacked up healthcare costs to a point where they are unaffordable by the majority of the people, etc. All that's just fine because look - racism is less!
Every time there's a thread on this forum about America then vs now, there is always a progressive who ignores everything else about the decline of society because we passed the Civil Rights Act. It's no problem that their Great Society has now cost 50 trillion dollars without setting the poverty rate even 1% lower, because Charlie Rangel is now free to call white people crackers on the radio while Paula Dean gets fired for having used the "n" word 20 years ago. It's such progress!
That's the usual progressive excuse. It's okay that they have racked up trillions of dollars in debt, try to control how much salt and soda we can have, spend hundreds of billions of dollars paying welfare to the people who don't have jobs because their taxes and regulations forced those jobs overseas, run a declining education system, have turned stable families into a 50% illegitimacy rate, have jacked up healthcare costs to a point where they are unaffordable by the majority of the people, etc. All that's just fine because look - racism is less!
Every time there's a thread on this forum about America then vs now, there is always a progressive who ignores everything else about the decline of society because we passed the Civil Rights Act. It's no problem that their Great Society has now cost 50 trillion dollars without setting the poverty rate even 1% lower, because Charlie Rangel is now free to call white people crackers on the radio while Paula Dean gets fired for having used the "n" word 20 years ago. It's such progress!
I never said anything about approving of any of the things on your list. What I'm saying is when we look at the past, we need to look at the WHOLE past. Not just remember the good bits.
I have a personal interest in American history during the era from the start of the Industrial Revolution up until the end of the Great Depression. Particularly in the realm of consumer goods, economics, advertising and medicine. I've read many books and watched documentaries on the period, and I'm quite aware what ordinary peoples' lives were like under the same system of laissez-faire capitalism today's conservatives seem to pine for. It's not a system most people today would want to live under.
Racism has not gone away. It's as powerful a force as it ever was in American politics. Appeals to the racist beliefs of people who don't consider themselves racists have helped bring about many of the problems on your list.
I never said anything about approving of any of the things on your list. What I'm saying is when we look at the past, we need to look at the WHOLE past. Not just remember the good bits.
I have a personal interest in American history during the era from the start of the Industrial Revolution up until the end of the Great Depression. Particularly in the realm of consumer goods, economics, advertising and medicine. I've read many books and watched documentaries on the period, and I'm quite aware what ordinary peoples' lives were like under the same system of laissez-faire capitalism today's conservatives seem to pine for. It's not a system most people today would want to live under.
Neither is a system of failing education, rampant drug use, violent crime, electronic strip searches to get on an airplane, offshored jobs, NSA spying, government mandated insurance, core curriculum, etc.
I am simply making the opposite point of the one you made. The advances that progressives have made - which I do not deny, there have been definite improvements in society due to progressive ideas - have come along with massive failures in the breakdown of the American family, the failing of education, the disappearing jobs, etc that progressives consistently fail to take any responsibility for. One time I heard Bob Beckel actually say that the Great Society was a mistake, that they had good intentions but had ended up creating a dependent society and I about fell out of my chair because it's so rare for a liberal to not claim that liberalism is perfect and all failures that have ever occurred are because of the right wing.
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Racism has not gone away. It's as powerful a force as it ever was in American politics. Appeals to the racist beliefs of people who don't consider themselves racists have helped bring about many of the problems on your list.
None of the problems on my list were brought about by appeals to racist beliefs. Racism has nothing to do with the decline of American education. Racism has nothing to do with annual deficits of half a trillion dollars. Racism has nothing to do with standing by and doing nothing while Iran develops nuclear weapons.
What does lead to the things on my list is accusations of racism. Not appeals to racism. But false accusations of conservative racism in order to fearmonger votes for progressive politicians, who once they get into office spend money like drunken sailors and pass excessive regulations and taxation on the very businesses that provide the middle class with jobs.
Neither is a system of failing education, rampant drug use, violent crime, electronic strip searches to get on an airplane, offshored jobs, NSA spying, government mandated insurance, core curriculum, etc.
I am simply making the opposite point of the one you made. The advances that progressives have made - which I do not deny, there have been definite improvements in society due to progressive ideas - have come along with massive failures in the breakdown of the American family, the failing of education, the disappearing jobs, etc that progressives consistently fail to take any responsibility for. One time I heard Bob Beckel actually say that the Great Society was a mistake, that they had good intentions but had ended up creating a dependent society and I about fell out of my chair because it's so rare for a liberal to not claim that liberalism is perfect and all failures that have ever occurred are because of the right wing.
None of the problems on my list were brought about by appeals to racist beliefs. Racism has nothing to do with the decline of American education. Racism has nothing to do with annual deficits of half a trillion dollars. Racism has nothing to do with standing by and doing nothing while Iran develops nuclear weapons.
What does lead to the things on my list is accusations of racism. Not appeals to racism. But false accusations of conservative racism in order to fearmonger votes for progressive politicians, who once they get into office spend money like drunken sailors and pass excessive regulations and taxation on the very businesses that provide the middle class with jobs.
Appeals to racism have everything to do with the things you listed. Politicians (usually conservative, but not always) use it to get elected. Then (the conservative ones anyway) proceed to enact legislation that harms the very people who elected them. And they eat it up because they think it will harm poor minorities more than them.
The idea that racists are all malicious bigots who use racist language is false. People can hold beliefs rooted in racism without actual hatred. That's why you see so much "I can't be racist, I have black friends" or "I'm not a racist, but..." before someone spouts off something totally racist without even realizing it.
Imagine a typical member of this "dependent society" you mentioned. What does that person look like in your mind's eye? Whites constitute most of the people on welfare and food stamps. Yet for most people the typical "welfare parasite" they imagine is a minority. That illustrates a belief rooted in racism, but most people who hold it will swear they're not racist.
If you really want your eyes opened on why conservatives are regularly called racist and how politicians are using racism to cynically manipulate voters to their own ends, I recommend starting here:
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