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This is the problem right here. Like you said, you spend most of your time with like minded people and probably get all your news and analysis from like minded sources. You think this stuff is new, like it has all come with Obama? Socialized medicine? What do you think Medicare and Medicade are? They are half of what makes socialized medicine socialized and they have been around for decades. In addition, Bill Clinton, who you said you like, tried to reform health care in 1994-5.
Subsidized food programs and housing? In one form or another have been around since the 1930's. This isnt new stuff and Obama certainly isn't the start of it all.
It's like hardcore conservatives and die hard republicans just forgot or have chosen to disregard history before 2008. Either that or they have been brainwashed, which is entirely possible. Scream it loud enough for a long enough time and eventually you will get people to believe you I guess.
You whole post is exactly what I think has been going on. The march to the left has been going on so long the "middle" itself is way to the left. We should be talking about ending these programs not reforming them or worse still adding new ones.
I think (wishfull Thinking) that finally the whole country is just so broke from these programs talk of ending them will finally start. But prolly not. just slap a band-aid on them and pass the debt to our children. When my daughter is paying even more then the stupid level of taxes her old man pays now all I will be able to tell her is I tried my best to stop it.
You whole post is exactly what I think has been going on. The march to the left has been going on so long the "middle" itself is way to the left. We should be talking about ending these programs not reforming them or worse still adding new ones.
I think (wishfull Thinking) that finally the whole country is just so broke from these programs talk of ending them will finally start. But prolly not. just slap a band-aid on them and pass the debt to our children. When my daughter is paying even more then the stupid level of taxes her old man pays now all I will be able to tell her is I tried my best to stop it.
Take a look around the world, even excluding Europe and Canada, and you will see that the average person in the United States is, in general, more conservative and has been throughout our history. To say our middle is way too left is to say the entire world is way, way too left, which I think says something about your viewpoint.
If we should end welfare, should we also end social security and medicare then?
This is why I'm surprised that the mod created this thread. Trying to convince those who still are supporting the right-wing agenda after what Bush, Cheney and Co. put this country though is futile. To support the Republican agenda only makes sense if you are one of those who benefits from it, IE the wealthy 10% who really control what occurs in Congress, and to a lesser extent, the Obama White House. That has been the great success of the right, to obscure the real agenda with the nonsense that Faux News, Rush and Glen et al foster. I'm afraid we will not recover from it.
You, and like minded people, are right and everyone else is wrong??
NY is a great place for that mind set, I'll give you that.
I can read, watch and talk about both sides and look for some middle ground. I'll never stop believing in what I do but understand I'm not king for even a day so how it ends up being will be neither sides dream come true.
Whats actually cracking me up here is based on jobs and houses owned and so forth posted here to me you guys are THE RICH to me. If I was a good little class warrior its YOU GUYS that would be paying the 90% tax rate. You all would fire back with some BS about how you went to college and got degrees and work hard for what you earn. Then I would say you were born lucky and you have contacts and all you did was party in school like the spoiled little rich brats you are and blah blah blah.
If you guys care so much about the poor why don't one of you buy me a car?? Or is talking about helping the poor more fun then doing it??
BTW I don't want you people to buy me a car, I will work for one like I do for everything else I have.
You whole post is exactly what I think has been going on. The march to the left has been going on so long the "middle" itself is way to the left. We should be talking about ending these programs not reforming them or worse still adding new ones.
I think (wishfull Thinking) that finally the whole country is just so broke from these programs talk of ending them will finally start. But prolly not. just slap a band-aid on them and pass the debt to our children. When my daughter is paying even more then the stupid level of taxes her old man pays now all I will be able to tell her is I tried my best to stop it.
I'm in the middle of reading Common Sense by Thomas Paine (1775), so I'm spilling over with quotes. I could probably hold an entire political conversation with them. lol
"Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer."
From Edward Gibbon, author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
I have not read the book so to be the context seems garbled but the point is dead on to where we are headed.
"In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all – security, comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.”
From Edward Gibbon, author of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire.
I have not read the book so to be the context seems garbled but the point is dead on to where we are headed.
"In the end, more than freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they lost it all – security, comfort, and freedom. When the Athenians finally wanted not to give to society but for society to give to them, when the freedom they wished for most was freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free and was never free again.”
Love it. I don't have a sure quote source, since the educated men around the time of the American Revolution (or perhaps- it will be known as the first...) seem to have it linked to them - and even then, it was an observation of early cultures - but here it is:
A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury. After that, the majority always votes for the candidate promising the most benefits with the result the democracy collapses because of the loose fiscal policy ensuing, always to be followed by a dictatorship, then a monarchy.
From bondage to spiritual faith;
From spiritual faith to great courage;
From courage to liberty;
From liberty to abundance;
From abundance to complacency;
From complacency to apathy;
From apathy to dependence;
From dependence back into bondage."
I agree that many social welfare programs are unnecessarily generous, not tightly controlled and don't have specific limitations that they should have. Abuses are widespread and there are now 4th and even 5th generation folks being raised on the public teat, from families who have always lived this way, know nothing else and have no motivation to live otherwise.
The "food stamps" program is laughable - it's clearly designed to benefit Big Agra's bottom line and allows purchase of foods that deteriorate people's health rather than benefit it.
Yes that is what I think but we need ot be realistic about what changes will help bring about progress without tearing apart the fabric of this society. My grandfather would rather have gone without a meal every other day than rely on "charity" - including financial help form his own children. He spent most of his life wearing a heavy iron leg brace and working on his feet all day - in pain - yet he returned to work at age 70 as a butcher because his savings were being depleted. It took my dad months to convince him that it was okay to accept Social security payments and that he had actually paid the taxes for it and was "getting his own money back." Without Social Security they would have lost their house and without Medicare his death would have been even more drawn out and agonizing than it really was. And it was pretty frickin' bad - I was 11 years old and spent a few years of Sunday visits watching him die in a hospital bed in his living room. When my dad was growing up in the 1930's they were the ONLY family on their two block long dead end street that was not on some sort of public assistance. So yes - I have a reference point for what it is to be poor.
When we went there for Sunday dinner the meal was boiled store brand hotdogs on white bread - and that was their "big meal" of the week. I was raised to believe that social welfare programs have a place in our society. If you want to call me a leftist for believing that - so be it.
The problem is worsened by the lack of opportunity for public dialogue - a chance for real people to explain what they believe and WHY they believe it. The media, especially the Fox news type organizations of the world, is not interested in dialogue. Rupert Murdoch has an agenda and believe me - it has nothing to do with making life more fair for those of us who work hard and pay taxes.
Last edited by phaelon56; 09-20-2011 at 08:20 AM..
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