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You're in the minority. The majority are against toll roads, and even in Texas, which has gone toll crazy in recent years, there has been push after push in the state house for TxDot to buy the toll roads from the contract holders and remove the tolls. And it's mainly due to angry constituents
Facts like these are a real problem for the no guboment folks...
Well, actually not so much, because they use the ignore feature like nobody else can!
While I think roads just like any infrastructure serving all of society should be in state hands, I reject tolls, they are just a pain in the neck. I prefer levying a road tax at the gas station. That would also promote economic cars and punish guzzlers. And the expensive toll infrastructure and waits would disappear.
Education existed at the time of the Constitution, but the Framers chose to make it exclusively the purview of the States and not the federal government.
Obviously, you've never read the committee meeting notes, because none of the Framers supported federal control of education for the most obvious reasons.
It is improper to compare homogeneous nation-States who are organized as unitary States with a heterogeneous federal republic, like the US.
There are three governmental systems, a unitary State, a confederation and a federation, and the Framers of the Constitution ignored the unitary State for obvious reasons, namely, that unitary States are only successful when the population is homogeneous.
The US was never homogeneous. Even before colonists arrived, the US had a heterogeneous population.
It costs what it costs. Doesn't matter who funds it, it still costs what it costs.
Kids don't need student loans, they want them.
There's a difference.
15 years ago, I got two additional undergraduate degrees, a Master's and a PhD and I didn't use student loans.
Only one of the four students I roomed with used student loans. The rest of us worked and relied on federal, State and private education grants.
And she only borrowed $2,000 the first year and $3,000 the second year. She could have borrowed $30,000 but she borrowed only what she needed.
That's part of the problem. Kids are borrowing $30,000 to pay for $8,000 to $15,000 in tuition, and then blowing the money on cars and breast implants and clothes and Spring Break in Cancun, and now they're mad, because they have to pay that money back.
I simply can't get into what the framers of our constitution where dealing with then vs what we are dealing with now, and that's another debate that tends to go nowhere. We have the constitution. We have what we have in the way of government now, according to that constitution, and that includes all we're considering in real terms today, including public education, health care, our space program and all the rest our founding fathers did not really have to think about like we must today.
Though I would just love to hear their thoughts today! Have their guidance. Don't get me wrong...
Your desire vs need perspective is easy to understand at a most fundamental level, but obviously ignores what most people/parents tend to believe about education. Just tell a parent who goes "to the end of the Earth" in order to help their kids get a better education and ask yourself why. Of course everyone DESIRES the best quality life they can achieve, but most people believe education is NEEDED in order to achieve that desire!
And who should or should not have that opportunity? Only those with the more money?
I too put myself through school, graduate school too, and most of it I was able to pay for without financial aid, but that scenario is not the same today! Obviously scholarships and grants are another story. My focus is on the challenge of the average American who doesn't have the benefit of a scholarship or grant or parents who pay their tuition, like I didn't. Not about you or me!
My focus is on how the more typical young American is going to manage a quality education today, not 15 years ago!
No it is not, when they cover / do not cover different things.
So still waiting to hear if I can get some reimbursements, lol.
The total federal revenue is 3.33 trillion or so. Out of which approx. 1.17 trillion is the payroll taxes. We spent 1 trillion + in military expenses. Nobody else is crazy to that, not with a 22 trillion in debt.
You're not aware of the number of films whose production start is either delayed, or never made at all, because the producers or directors (or both) can't get the actors they want.
When Tom Cruise was in town with Dustin Hoffman to film Rain Man, it stimulated the local economy, albeit temporarily. The set design is local workers. Transportation is local workers. Caterers are local workers. Extras are local.
Yes, they have caterers on set. Not only that, there are people going round providing candy, snacks, food and refreshments for the crew, who might number 100 to 350 people. It's not free, the production company pays for it. And they all stay in hotels and spend money locally shopping, dining and entertaining themselves, plus they attract visitors who do the same.
"Green Book" wins best picture, and a must see far as I'm concerned! Also helps to gain some perspective behind some of what made for this gap we're going on about here. Fortunately we've come a long way since the days depicted in this film and unfortunately, we've still got a lot of progress still to make!
Or might that comment belong better in another thread (unfortunately now closed)...
So I'll post this recent article here, back on our knees.
"Eight Mississippi players knelt during the national anthem in response to a Confederacy rally near the arena before their victory over Georgia on Saturday. With the teams lined up across the court at the free throw lines, six players took a knee and bowed at the start of the The Star-Spangled Banner. Two other players later joined them."
“This was all about the hate groups that came to our community to try spread racism and bigotry,” Ole Miss coach Kermit Davis said. “It’s created a lot of tension for our campus. Our players made an emotional decision to show these people they’re not welcome on our campus, and we respect our players’ freedom and ability to choose that.”
Someone said aid/welfare should be paid for with voluntary contributions rather than taxes. I don't think it makes sense to make people's lives depend on the whims of potential donors. People should know that when they really need help, they are entitled to get it.
I don't agree with how you might go about deciding what people earn for whatever they do for a living, but I do agree reliance on charity is simply not moral, ethical or viable. I also don't agree people are "entitled" to help but that people who truly need help should be able to get that help if we as a society can reasonably provide that help, especially with life's basics like food and shelter, for starters. Education and health care too...
Short answer is not to think there will ever be a day when we don't have poor people and/or rich people...
THAT IS YOUR FIRST MISTAKE.
Poverty is caused by money madness, not cured by it.
Wealth is not prosperity. Nor will redistribution of wealth end poverty. In fact, money is the cause of poverty, not the cure. If money was the cure for poverty, then let us permanently eradicate the “need for money,” by crediting everyone with 22 billion billion quatloos. Now, no one ever needs money again. They have more than they can ever spend. Does that end poverty? No. Even the starving children are phenomenally wealthy.
Unless the masses are laboring, producing, transporting and selling surplus goods and services, all that money is useless, worthless, and meaningless... and civilization collapses.
Prosperity is based on the production, equitable trade, and enjoyment of surplus usable goods and services. Doing more with less so more can enjoy is superior to doing less with more so few can enjoy. The only valid function of a medium of exchange is to facilitate equitable trade - of all that is available for sale - not constrained by scarcity of precious metals, debt-credit, or whatever is used for a money token.
Anything that impedes prosperity is contrary to good sense.
Unmet need, unemployment, underemployment, closed factories and retailers are the result of a lack of money impeding prosperity. And yet if everyone had "enough" money, the system would collapse.
Governments are supposed to "protect the people". They aren't doing it very well as the gap is huge! It isn't an easy job, but you could probably have taxation on the super wealthy. Say if you are making a million or more a year you could have an extra tax the progresses. Use those funds to better our country. This all isn't as easy as it looks however.
Not sure about governments, all governments, but I do know how the preamble to our constitution reads in terms of guidance for our government, going well beyond strict protection...
"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
You didn’t know? FirebirdCamaro gets to decide what’s truly important.
I think people who start threads should get to decide what's important, what others should do, be able to control what others think and be compensated for the effort!
Is 1 trillion + in military spending in the Constitution? If so, quote where exactly. There is huge overspending and waste, and I don't think I need to post how much we spend compared to the rest of the world. The British are not coming, and the Martians are not coming either. Period.
I think NASA is in there somewhere too, but no doubt the authors of the constitution forgot the amendment prohibiting overspending and waste. That was a big missed call...
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