Political Roundtable Cosmic String of Cataclysm - Part V

[Zonkerbl]

Not in response to you , Popper. Pure wild coincidence -- lots of welfare studies coming out recently, I guess.

[doclinkin]

Zonk - I don't think the Senate report was looking in to fraudulent claims but instead established that it is more lucrative for a household to collect benefits for not working vs. working and earning $50K or less. In other words, better to be on the govt. dole than have a job paying $50K.

No it is not. No it does not:

UPDATE: ...it should be pointed out the $168 includes all costs incurred by the federal government to deliver benefits, including administrative costs.

(addendum to the article).

[popper]

Zonk - I don't think the Senate report was looking in to fraudulent claims but instead established that it is more lucrative for a household to collect benefits for not working vs. working and earning $50K or less. In other words, better to be on the govt. dole than have a job paying $50K.

No it is not. No it does not:

UPDATE: ...it should be pointed out the $168 includes all costs incurred by the federal government to deliver benefits, including administrative costs.

(addendum to the article).

Good catch doc. I wish they would tell the reader what percentage of the $168 per day is govt. cost for processing and delivering the welfare payments. Do you know that figure?

[doclinkin]

Nope.

The article is poorly resourced, and trying to track down the info from Jeff Sessions' (R-'Bama) site proved fruitless so far (defunct links, no hard data pages, just fluff). But I recall reading that the government saves a good deal of money since the majority of people who qualify for government assistance do not take advantage of it.

Not sure if that actually makes your point for you (we pay for services that we do not deliver to those who need them) but nobody is getting rich off welfare.

Closest case I can see is the few who manage to qualify for subsidized housing have a disincentive to earn above a certain amount or they will be kicked off the rolls. The demand for housing and rent vouchers far exceeds the supply and nobody wants to have to be forced to move so I suspect there's a few people gaming the system there.

That said, in NYC I knew a homeless family who finally qualified for subsidized housing and the look on those kids faces when they explored the tiny apartment was invaluable. Her kids got health care, education, she got afterschool care while she worked and took classes -- all subsidized by tax dollars-- and I heard eventually she was able to get a loan to buy her own place. They were living in a box under an elevated rail platform and the kids had ringworm etc. Husband died young, they had no insurance, etc. String of bad luck. I'd accept a few people gaming the system to prevent those kids from having to take turns sitting up at night with broomhandle spears to watch for rats and the like.

It's worth a few dollars siphoned from the creme at the top to provide assistance for those who truly need it. A civil society looks out for the disadvantaged, it is one of the burdens if success: to whom much is given much is expected. And the truth is it provides insurance even for the comfortable and well off: epidemics start in an overcrowded malnourished populace; to say nothing of insurgency, domestic terrorism etc. There are not as many jobs in the world as there are people willing and able to work them Just a fact, some people will slip through the cracks. Are you bribing the populace to remain complacent? Maybe, but otherwise you'd be paying that cost elsewhere in mercenary escorts and armored transports to protect deliveries to pharmacies and supermarkets. Food, medicine, pampers, and baby formula. No mother will let their baby suffer without trying something radical to solve the problem.

[doclinkin]

But that said it's a really stupid article. I could sum the salaries and bonuses of all the McDonalds CEOs and franchise owners then divide by the total number of employees to show you how overpaid your average fry guy is compared to school teachers and policemen. Would make a cute graph, but not a useful bit of information.

[hands11]

If Rs were really worried about hand outs, waste and personal liberties, you would think they would be screaming about the jail system.

We arrest people for things like pot and put them in jail for it. How much does that cost all of us to house them and ruin their career chances. Since they claim to be strict constitutional conservatives, you think they would be fighting for equal protection under the law. Why do they not take up the fight against the imbalance of who is arrested for these kind of things.

Since they hate wasteful spending, why are they not concerned with how the government gives hand outs to privatized jails to warehouse people for profit for crimes that don't meet their libertarian ideas ?

How about getting the government out of our personal lives and not arresting people for things that are none of their business and then making us pay private companies for it.

Perfect example of why everything should not be privatized. We do not want jailing people to be a maximizing profits model just like we shouldn't privatize war. Those are government functions. There should be no profit incentive in jailing or killing people. To do so it kind of sick.

Next, punishment or rehab.
This is where Rs really fail humanity. Sure we all have a vengeance side to us. We want those who did really wrong things to pay for what they did. But what can be done to help people avoid this path in life to begin with and what can be done to help rehab people so they can go from the government paying to jail them to working and contribution to society. Oh course we want to the most dangerous people removed from society to protect the rest of us. But we do so much more then that.

Its a slippery slope. Go to much one way and you remove the punishment for doing wrong. Go to much the other way and you allow and environment to exist that produces more people that end up catch up in this system that we all pay for anyway.

Doing nothing cost money and lives. Doing something cost and is tricky also. So what do you do ? Rs are focused on things like 3 strikes. Punishment. Dems are more focuses on rehab and head starts to keep people out of these traps. Which is more human and respectful of human dignity and God like values ?

My observation is that Rs support the easy answers to problems. If it fits in a 3 word sound bit, it must be the right answer. Rarely is life that simple. Cutting taxes is not the answer to every economic problem. Nor is drill baby drill. Our economic issues are way more complicated then " we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. Being prolife is way more then just stopping abortions. And government is not always the problem. And while it may make them feel good, Dems are not the party of big government anymore then Rs are. Actually, I could argue that Rs support more big government and handout then Dems do.

[popper]

If Rs were really worried about hand outs, waste and personal liberties, you would think they would be screaming about the jail system.

We arrest people for things like pot and put them in jail for it. How much does that cost all of us to house them and ruin their career chances. Since they claim to be strict constitutional conservatives, you think they would be fighting for equal protection under the law. Why do they not take up the fight against the imbalance of who is arrested for these kind of things.

Since they hate wasteful spending, why are they not concerned with how the government gives hand outs to privatized jails to warehouse people for profit for crimes that don't meet their libertarian ideas ?

How about getting the government out of our personal lives and not arresting people for things that are none of their business and then making us pay private companies for it.

Perfect example of why everything should not be privatized. We do not want jailing people to be a maximizing profits model just like we shouldn't privatize war. Those are government functions. There should be no profit incentive in jailing or killing people. To do so it kind of sick.

Next, punishment or rehab.
This is where Rs really fail humanity. Sure we all have a vengeance side to us. We want those who did really wrong things to pay for what they did. But what can be done to help people avoid this path in life to begin with and what can be done to help rehab people so they can go from the government paying to jail them to working and contribution to society. Oh course we want to the most dangerous people removed from society to protect the rest of us. But we do so much more then that.

Its a slippery slope. Go to much one way and you remove the punishment for doing wrong. Go to much the other way and you allow and environment to exist that produces more people that end up catch up in this system that we all pay for anyway.

Doing nothing cost money and lives. Doing something cost and is tricky also. So what do you do ? Rs are focused on things like 3 strikes. Punishment. Dems are more focuses on rehab and head starts to keep people out of these traps. Which is more human and respectful of human dignity and God like values ?

My observation is that Rs support the easy answers to problems. If it fits in a 3 word sound bit, it much be the right answer. Rarely is life that simple. Cutting taxes is not the answer to every economic problem. Nor is drill baby drill. Our economic issues are way more complicated then " we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. Being prolife is way more then just stopping abortions. And government is not always the problem. And while it may make them feel good, Dems are not the party of big government anymore then Rs are. Actually, I could argue that Rs support more big government and handout then Dems do.

I'm a conservative who is against the war on drugs and incarcerating people for smoking weed and perhaps some other drugs as well. I am also against different sentences for crack vs. coke use. Not sure about privatizing prisons. I don't see a big difference between public and private prisons but maybe there is one and I am uninformed about it. I do see your point that it seems a bit odd that private companies can profit off the misery of others.

You say Rs look for easy answers and Ds are more wise in understanding and solving problems in society. I see very little evidence that the war on poverty is succeeding. I see little to no evidence that the clean energy initiative is working. I see little evidence that our urban schools are achieving the results that our country so desperately needs.

In my view our leaders seem more concerned with the politics of achieving and maintaining power than they are in actually understanding and solving problems. Maybe term limits is the solution?

Edit - some of our reps are dinosaurs that hang around for 20 or 30 yrs. in office and seem completely out of touch with the rest of society. They sure do seem to enjoy the trappings of power though.

[hands11]

You say Rs look for easy answers and Ds are more wise in understanding and solving problems in society. I see very little evidence that the war on poverty is succeeding. I see little to no evidence that the clean energy initiative is working. I see little evidence that our urban schools are achieving the results that our country so desperately needs.

----

Pop, again, you would fit better as a conservative Dem given your views and open mindedness to things.

As for seeing no evidence that clean energy initiatives are working. Look again.

War on poverty. That is not a war that is even won but we have made better progress in the past and we are trying to do it again. Its called investing in the middle class and recovering from the Great Recession. It also means ending the trend of more and more wealth gathering with the top 2% while productivity continues to increase by wages stay flat. That is not the American Dream.

And for each of these topics, we could have made more progress if there wasn't one party constantly blocking that progress. And actually it is much much worse. We were living in that progress during the Clinton years but one party took us into two endless wars and huge deficits by passing tax cuts during those wars that were not paid for.

[hands11]

Debt Ceiling and the Filibuster.

Just in case any of you missed this, this is just crazy stupid and incompetent.

Mitch McConnell Filibusters His Own Bill

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/ ... _bill.html

Sen. Mitch McConnell is not a good leader. He is a good blow hard and good at getting nothing done. He is a antagonist. A good little robot with robot responses. Always partition. Never part of a solution. I have zero respect for his man and he is an embarrassment to a once proud party that is now is decay.

Guess he is so used to blocking stuff it was a reflex reaction. The Party of no tells themselves....no.

[Zonkerbl]

A list of ways to "tax plan" to avoid paying taxes:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ ... ml?hpid=z1

"Americans are moving to sell investment homes, off-load stocks, expand charitable donations and establish tax-sheltering gifts before the end of the year. "

[Wizardspride]

Click on the link to read the rest.

http://www.fa-mag.com/news/obama-win...ate-12840.html

Obama Wins Almost 50% Of Republicans On Tax Mandate



President Barack Obama won the public argument over taxes so decisively that almost half of Republicans now say he has an election mandate to raise rates on the rich, a poll says.

Majorities of about 2-to-1 also read the election results as an endorsement of Obama’s pledge to protect Social Security and Medicare benefits, according to a Bloomberg National Poll of 1,000 adults conducted Dec. 7-10.

And Obama confronts his first post-election test -- negotiations with Congress to avert a slate of automatic tax increases and spending cuts in January that have become known as the so-called fiscal cliff -- with his highest level of public support since his first year in office.

The president’s job approval strengthened to 53 percent from 49 percent in September. The last time he enjoyed that level of public backing was December 2009, when his job approval was 54 percent.

The combined findings give Obama “an opportunity to negotiate from a position of strength,” said Ann Selzer, the founder of Selzer & Co., a Des Moines, Iowa-based firm that conducted the poll. “This is what the public is saying he was elected to do.”

[hands11]

So back to what is really going on and which party backs each action.

First, a station break that pretty much nails the entire story.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6ZsXrzF8Cc

So you have a handful of mega rich who want to continue to buy our government and take it away from representing the masses of people. And there is one party that is there mega mouth piece.

And what is worse is that you can't even totally true the Dems. At least at the highest level you can't. HSBC...Nothing. Drug laws. States rights. Failure by Eric Holder. Why ? There is a ton of money in keeping drugs illegal. Dismantling the unions is going to make the Dems Republican light because they will have to sell out to the same money supply. Which is what big money wants to happen. Head the win. Tails, they mostly win.

Until the election process is reformed, they people voices will not be representation.

Seems the press as been late to announce the War we really have been in.

The War on Democracy.

[hands11]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B0RbU_UhCA[/youtube]

[montestewart]

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B0RbU_UhCA[/youtube]

I haven't read any reviews of this film. Is it good? (No spoilers, please.)

[Nivek]

I like pine's strict constructionist idea on 2nd amendment. Everyone who wants one can have a muzzle-loading musket.

[barelyawake]

Better non-lethal weapons is the answer. The question is how can we deflate the gun market; increase personal protection; deal with the issues of safety and suicide regarding home protection; stop the infringement of rights; and find a way to stop a gunman in a dark, crowded theater or one who is surrounded by kids?

The answer is inflating the non-lethal weapons market so the market has incentive to innovate non-lethal weapons that are viable option for long range immobilization of an attacker. Basically, we need ray guns. But, more effective netguns, pepper-spray, sound devices and stun guns are a good start. What do you want in a crowded, dark theater when a gunman starts shooting: 100 citizens armed with guns, unarmed or armed with truly effective, long range immobilization weapons, so there are no unintended victims?

[Induveca]

I personally like the obvious solution. If banks can be manned by armed guards at every entrance in the US, so can schools. My high school as a kid had guys with heavy weaponry at the doors. There were multiple security points to get even near the children.

[pancakes3]

That's an expensive solution. Shocking considering the source.

[Induveca]

That's an expensive solution. Shocking considering the source.

This is a situation where cutting certain funding for a dire need isn't a horribly difficult thing.

Should kids enjoy 1/3rd less after school programs in exchange for a secure environment? Obviously the answer is yes.

Easiest solution is forcing gun lobbies to fund it through federal gun permit cost increases.

There should be nothing "partisan" about this, unfortunately every comment in US politics is perceived as such.....and roped into the gang mentality with every other supposed "talking point".

Don't miss it.....

[popper]

At a minimum, residents who own guns in a household where a mentally ill person resides should be required to keep their weapons locked up. They should also pay a fee for the local sheriff to confirm the foregoing. Don't most of these mass murderers have documented mental issues?