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More Millennials Would Give Up Voting Than Texting (nypost.com)
An anonymous reader quotes the New York Post:
As the staggering national student loan debt tally sits at an all-time high of $1.33 trillion, according to the Department of Education, many millennials say they would go to extreme lengths to wipe their slate clean. According to a new survey from Credible, a personal finance website, 50 percent of all respondents (ages 18-34) said they would give up their right to vote during the next two presidential elections in order to never have to make another loan payment again.
Yet only 44% said they'd be willing to give up Uber and Lyft -- and only 13% said they'd be willing to give up texting.
Yet only 44% said they'd be willing to give up Uber and Lyft -- and only 13% said they'd be willing to give up texting.
Depends on whether this is an individual action, or a large scale "buyout" such as the poll "demonstrates". An individual can do this and as long as their peers don't, the impact will be negligible if it matters whatsoever. However, if the results match the poll, or otherwise happen on a large scale, then it could seriously impact the election results, or have consequences beyond the elections. A move to restrict texting following such a fiasco would be surprising, even from the more responsible members of the country. Would such be necessary to protect our nation from ineptitude? Would it protect our nation from ineptitude?
it's hard to think that way about voting. Our last election was Giant Douche vs a Turd Sandwich both of which were rammed down our throats.
Thing is, you need to get people to show up to primaries, but it's hard enough to get them to mid terms. Voter suppression doesn't help matter either. I don't know about the rest of you folks but I waited 3 hours in line to vote for Bernie in my primary. That wasn't an accident. Nor was it because of overwhelming turnout.
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In the climate today you would be forced to have a smartphone with only government approved apps and entertainment. But you would have a forced entertainment quota to fulfill every day.
That would keep a lot of people busy.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Collectively deciding to vote is precisely what can help our youth build the sort of future they want. Giving up their right to vote will just ensure that theyâ(TM)re saddled with burdens shifted from other populations who do vote!
I'm surprised that it's only 50%. Given that voter turnout in the average presidential election is only about 50-60% without extra incentives not to vote, it's hard to imagine that you couldn't come up with another 10% who would skip voting in exchange for a big pile of cash.
How can we continue to believe in a just universe and freedom to eat crackers if we have no ale?
Straw Man. No political party is going to take away anyone's smartphone. The apps are the bread & circuses needed to keep the electorate amused and distracted, the rest of it is the key conduit through which they are surveilled.
what about 2-3 years in jail/prison to wipe them away. (don't tell them that room + board + doctors are free in there)
I think this says more about the kabuki-show of voting in the US than it does about young people. Too many people 18-34 have figured out that voting has little or nothing to do with who ends up in power. You can vote for "outsiders" and "change agents" and you still end up with some guy from Goldman Sachs making decisions about your life while he flies his trophy wife to Fort Knox to perform some satanic sexual ritual over the gold during a total eclipse.
Seriously, a show of hands: in an age of gerrymandered, electoral colleged, voter suppressed, primary rigged, black box voting machine, foreign government influenced elections, where the guy who loses the vote gets to rule, who wouldn't give up their right to this meaningless exercise in exchange for the forgiveness of $100,000.00 in debt?
You are welcome on my lawn.
They're unable to come to a logical conclusion.
No shit, they got themselves saddled with crippling debt to begin with. I'll grant you, it's hardly fair to prey upon these kids, but they are adults technically. I wouldn't dream of depriving them of the consequences of their actions.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
What's the point of voting when the electoral college makes your vote irrelevant?
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
smart millennials...they dont want to vote against trump because he will win again so, gosh, keep the texting, another no brainer.
For eight years I've heard Republicans screaming about the Obama Phone being iPhones and how those other people shouldn't have them. Never mind that no one could tell me where to sign up for a government-subsidized iPhone. Now that Obama is out of office, no one is talking about it.
I knew Trump would win, too many radio stations, church congregations, and family members of mine, all voting for Trump. What I have trouble imagining is Trump being a two term president. We're not even one year into his presidency and several people are already ready to jump ship from the Trump bandwagon. I'm not sure we can last four years, so I doubt he will be re-elected. The only reason Trump would be re-elected is if there seemed to be some "stragglers" in Washington who would be expected to quit their jobs if Trump was re-elected. That whole "drain the swamp, whatever the cost" thing.
Because texting actually works? You seem to think the government grants rights rather than is supposed to protect them.
50 percent of all respondents (ages 18-34) said they would give up their right to vote during the next two presidential elections in order to never have to make another loan payment again.
When put like that it sounds bad.
But when you turn it around it's a damn good deal. The average student debt in the US is about $37,000. If you asked the population in general whether they would give up 2 presidential votes in exchange for $37k I expect that way over 50% of the voting public would snatch it out of your hand.
And when you consider that the youngest adults will be the ones with the highest debt, they would be the most "expensive" ones to buy-off.
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
Because giving up the vote is an irreversible process? Hint: It's not.
How does their debt cripple them?
...and these are the muppets we are entrusting the future to.
They'll be far too distracted with trivial shit like facetwit, far too worried about their online popularity, and far too leftie/peecee passive to ever do what it takes to defend important stuff like rights/freedoms. Goodbye constitution, hello slavery.
Jail is just another place to live. I am sick and have been largely confined to medical facilities for the past few months.
Or perhaps they hold to the "Alcoholic's Anonymous" school of thought, wherein to make any sort of change one must hit rock bottom. The one who must hit bottom being our nation as a whole.
My vote has never meant anything in presidential elections anyway, and never will. It only has half the theoretical electoral college weight of a voter in other states to begin with, and it's a single party state with a winner take all electoral vote system so there's never any doubt about the outcome. So I'll gladly give up that farce for $10, as long as I can continue voting on everything else.
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because it was still only a small number of (mostly old and conservative) people showing up for the primary. If the primaries had the same turnout as the General we'd be saying President Bernie right now because Clinton's shenanigans wouldn't have flown. You need tight margins for cheating to work in elections.
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I hacked the voting machine to send my texts!
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
I've never taken a loan, what does that poll question even mean? Is the premise that I'm going to be able to borrow a billion dollars, invest it, and retire living off the interest because I'll only have to pay off the principal?
That only 50% of people would give up voting for that kind of power is astounding.
I think there is a serious discussion hidden in there, voting is a social responsibility, not an act for which you derive personal benefit. How much personal cost people are willing to endure in order to exercise that responsibility is an important question. A question that comes up every election when some populations suddenly find they need forms of ID they don't normally acquire, or their district suddenly doesn't have sufficient polling stations. The question of how much cost they're willing to endure can decide elections.
I just find these survey questions to be nonsensical.
I stole this Sig
A lot of it comes from student loans which in the U.S. cannot be discharged through bankruptcy. So there are a lot of people who took on tens of thousands of dollars in student loans to go to expensive schools for degrees that don't have a lot of value in the job market or necessarily provide the kinds of skills that allow a person to start working in something other than a minimum wage job.
Once they're in that spot, they're pretty screwed because their earning power and the large principle of their loans means that they'll be making interest payments for decades.
I understand why it is that politics turns you off, but there's something you need to consider, especially since you're going to be a mother soon: There are plenty of people out there who do care to make their wishes known so far as what direction our country will go and how it's run -- and they do not care if you're happy about the results or even what happens to you and your family, so long as they get what they want. There are people out there right now who would see you disenfranchised entirely, merely because you're a woman, make it illegal for you to have your own money, own property, run a business, and considered the 'property' of your husband, who would have the legal right to do with you as he wished -- including beating and killing you, if he felt justified. Do you really want to live in a country like that? Do you want your children to inherit a world like that? That's why you need to care about 'politics': so that your voice, and the voices of everyone who thinks and feels the way you do about things, can be heard, so those who represent you in Congress can work to enact the Will of the People, all the people, not just the rich and the power-hungry. You do it for yourself, you do it for your kids, and their kids, and so on. The alternative is to live like a slave, having no say whatsoever in the course your life takes, because The Few speak while The Many are silent -- or silenced. It doesn't matter if it's something as small as some inconsequential little local ordinance that your city is voting on, or as big as who is President, you either exercise your right to make your wishes known, or someone else will see their wishes enforced on you.
So after half the millenials gave up their vote to get rid of loans, a law was proposed that restricts the voting of young and clearly incompetent individuals. All the old guys voted in favor of this.
-=This sig has nothing to do with my comment. Move along now=-
And most people who are unsympathetic towards this likely got their education at a time when it was actually possible to do so without crippling debt, then entered a job market that provided them with more opportunities.
While it may not be how our founding fathers envisioned things, the people in power are quite content with how things are turning out.
Disenfranchise so many voters that they simply don't even care about it anymore. Make voting as painful and unpleasant as possible with absolutely no reward. Make it seem utterly pointless. Also ensure that every campaign promise remains unfilled and forgotten, so people feel totally conned and don't bother in the next election.
All is as it is supposed to be, according to the few and powerful.
If every eligible voter in this country actually voted, the entire system would likely implode. Our system could not even come close to handling a proper turnout. It's not designed to.
And if in young minds, the right to SMS is more valuable than the right to vote, well, we are lost. Doomed to follow in the path of the ancient Romans. Was a good run though.
There is no practical difference. "Rights" are a human construct, invented by humans. The universe gives no fucks about your "rights."
Rights only exist as long as people protect them.
It is IF you vote away your freedoms in return for gov handouts.
See Venezuela.
Running with Linux for over 20 years!
I'm with Octorian. In addition, I suspect that those unsympathetic fail to realize that salaries and education are typically linked. Failing to get an education dooms one to a lower salary, and there is a ripple effect on one's life as a result of settling for a lesser lifestyle in a nation which opposes settling, and promotes risk taking for opportunity and reward.
Dear US Americans,
I tried to express my concern regarding your countries condition in a polite way, but that would have included a lengthly discussion of indicators which no one would have read. Therefore, in short: You are so fucked!
While other countries support their students with a basic income and allow them to study free of charge, you have to pay for it. In addition you seem not to have learned critical thinking at school, college and university otherwise you would not depend on Uber but disregard voting.
You people.need to start to think logically and go into politics. Yes that will get messy. Yes it is ugly. And yes you might end up being a zombi like those in congress, but that is up to you. Otherwise you will wake up in an Imperium Americanum with a Cesar as President and a paralized congress (senate to stay in the picture). Oh wait .... never mind.
It still is entirely possible to do this, but you can't go to an expensive school and run up $20,000+ in loans each year, while spending 5 years to get a degree that doesn't improve your job prospects. There's no point in someone getting a history degree if all they're capable of doing with their life is working in retail as opposed to someone who's going to go on to law school to get a J.D. after getting their B.S.
In the case of someone who is not going to benefit from going to college, their financial situation is going to be completely different if they spend five years working and building up capital and gaining job skills than if they spend five years running up student loan debts and getting a degree that only allows them to fill the same job they could have taken five years prior.
Why force people to do something when you can them just addict them to Facebook and other texting stuff? You do not need to repeat history by the letter, it is enough to get the same results.
Thanks to filter bubble people are mentally isolated. Thanks.to "free market" radio stations you already have homogenized public opinion, like in any good dictatorship. The Nazis did it by law, but that is not a necessity. You could also do that by resource control/money.
Have you asked the Cherokee what they think of that?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
...is functioning exactly as intended. Docking almost complete.
You're looking at that from the wrong perspective. They did vote, and they voted against the oompa loompa, but in the end it didn't matter and he got elected anyway. The ones who were smart enough to read up on how the electoral college works even knew ahead of time that their votes were never going to matter. What's the point of voting when it can't change anything?
Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)
It is IF you vote away your freedoms in return for gov handouts. See Venezuela.
So, you want to do away with food stamps, medicaid, medicare, social security et cetera?
Since there is no collateral to repossess, they shouldn't allow bankruptcy.
Then the able-bodied but believed mentally-unstable but actually got treatment goes all attacky on them. Do you really think no one who sympathizes with them wouldn't be in the military?
You can't actually vote away your freedoms. You can only vote in the illusion that someone can keep you from them.
Do you often have conversations with yourself via different acounts?
...is functioning exactly as intended. Docking almost complete.
Fixed that for you!
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
While it sounds like you get it, for the most part. There are somewhat differing economic conditions, and shifting cultural norms. So, yeah, Millennials do exist. They just are not this arbitrary typecast nonsense which has been ballyhooed in the media so much. - A millennial.
Just let the millennials vote by texting, problem solved.
Of course some may argue that this will make voting insecure, but with electronic voting machines, it already is.
> likely got their education at a time when it was actually possible to do so without crippling debt
You mean like right now, for example? My tuition at a state school is $6,000 / year. The tax credit is $1,500 / year, so net cost $4,500 / year. Some of my classes had as the final exam the Cisco and Microsoft certification exams. Getting those certs helped increase my income even before I finished school, so I'll finish school with more money in the bank than I started with - essentially a negative amount of student debt.
I majored in Information Technology - Security, so I'll have a six figure income right about the time I graduate.
A person CAN choose to get a worthless degree from an expensive school, or they get can a valuable degree from an affordable school.
Sorry, but Hillary didn't win.
Of course. Don't you support universal basic income?
If you think I voted for Trump because of this post, you're wrong. I voted for Dr. Jill Stein of the Green Party. Again.
If the Democrats put up another deeply-flawed and wholly unlikeable candidate again, I can see Trump winning a second term. This election was the Democrats' to lose, and they lost it with great aplomb. I've noticed one huge difference between Donald Trump and popular Democrats like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. I think most people will agree that Trump is an ass, but unlike the Democrats (and a lot of Republicans for that matter, like John McCain), he doesn't regularly insult the voters. He will personally attack individuals, often in ways that are really tacky and immature, but I've never heard him say anything negative about the American people, not even subsets of Americans, like liberals. This is something the Democrats have clearly failed to learn, and a significant reason, I think, why people like Trump despite his flaws.
You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.
Things people do in text messages have a direct, verifiable impact on their personal lives. Leaving aside the whole Electoral College system point, the President is only a single branch of the government, and the least important one IMHO. Changes in the head of state may create ripples that down the line impact me personally, but for the most part I see very little difference in my prosperity when the President changes from a D to an R. Changes in Congress have a bigger role because they actually make laws, and I see changes in state and local government influencing things things more.
Free communications (beer and speech) is more important than the vote.
Dialectician. Archology.
If the Democrats put up another deeply-flawed and wholly unlikeable candidate again ...
Can you name any prominent likable Democrats without deep flaws?
The voting age is set to 18 by the 26th amendment to the Constitution of the United States. A mere "law" cannot change that.
This is the equivalent of asking the question "have you stopped beating your wife yet" with the option of "Yes" or "No". "Not texting" could never be employed as a mechanism to wipe out debt. "Not voting" could very well be funded and pay for loans. Crap study.
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
Well Kim Jong Un certainly goes along with that kind of thinking. Enjoy your radioactive smoking wasteland.
Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
And most people who are unsympathetic towards this likely got their education at a time when it was actually possible to do so without crippling debt
It is still possible. Go to a cheap community college for the first two years while living at home. Then transfer to a four year college for the final two years and either work part time, get a TEACH grant, or a military scholarship.
Warning: May require work, commitment, and sacrifice.
Yup. More over, a lot of students never did a simple cost vs benefits analysis. I know doctors leaving school who have to live with their parents because they can't afford their loans, and probably never will be able to. Some even signed on for those debt forgiveness programs, where they go work with the under privileged for 10 years to get their debt wiped out, earning pennies while they're at it. They spent 8+ years getting their degrees, then are spending another 10+ years earning nothing much, so by the time they're 36 they haven't even gotten a real financial start on their life.
It's insanity. I don't blame the non-bankruptcy part of the equation, but rather the "guaranteed" loan part. If the government is guaranteeing funds flowing directly to colleges with no consequences, of course colleges are going to keep spending more and more and more. Why wouldn't they? Meanwhile, it's the dumbass kids whose lives are ground to dust in the process.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Maybe, so? Doesn't mean they're wrong, just means they're assholes.
Personally, I my concern is more on the sustainability of the system. As it currently stands, it's impossible to sustain but worse; if you have your normally high wage earners saddled with life long student debt, the economy take a huge hit. That, in turn, will effect us all.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Since there is no collateral to repossess, they shouldn't allow bankruptcy.
Allowing discharge through bankruptcy would make these loans much more expensive (higher interest rates), so responsible students would be subsidizing the deadbeats. This would lead to a death spiral as better students could seek out other funding options (such as income-share agreements) while only the most desperate (and most likely to default) would remain, pushing rates even higher.
so i guess, it's just fair if the millennials are confused about how this democracy stuff works.
Sounds like a lot of other Slashdot readers already get this, but the votes that matter most are for the people geographically closest to where you live.
The people we voted in as our city council members and mayor have already made more decisions that impact my life than anything Trump has done.
The President in America is only slightly less of a figurehead than than Queen of England, and that's been by design since the nation was founded. If you visit the Old Courthouse in Annapolis, MD - you can see the original letter General George Washington wrote when he declined the offer to become the first King of the USA, right after the Revolutionary War. He felt that control of the nation shouldn't be in the hands of just one individual like that, and just wanted to go back to farming his land. He wound up our first President, instead, by a unanimous vote.
When you really look back at the claimed "big accomplishments" of past Presidents, much of it had more to do with advisors and other staff members putting the ideas forward and convincing the President to get behind them. Ronald Reagan's "trickle down economics" was a great example. He didn't come up with that idea himself. He wasn't even a Finance guy ... just a former Hollywood actor. In other cases, we don't really know if a President really had a plan themselves or not -- but we do know that many changes they make just get watered down or reversed within a decade's time. (President Clinton was famous for his "welfare to work" policy, where he mandated time limits on how long welfare could be collected. In the years that followed, the states slowly dismantled that with exceptions to rules and changes - so today, none of that has any effect on how the system works.) Obama's presidency made a lot of claims about improving our economic and employment conditions - yet historically, we know the economy is cyclical. If you have a boom, you have a bust that follows it, and vise-versa. Become a president when the economy is poor and just hang in there, and you'll eventually be able to take credit for the inevitable turn-around.
I don't want to discount Presidential voting as irrelevant ... but choosing wisely in the Primaries is where you really get more control over who wins. By the time you're at the general election, you've literally got over a dozen contenders who didn't make it -- quite often for the wrong reasons. (Candidates with well known names often get automatic advantages over people nobody has heard of. And candidates pouring more money into trying to win the election can make some of the others look bad for just long enough to bump them out of the running. Reality might be that those "also rans" were actually more qualified candidates all along.)
Ex-felons can't vote, am I correct? So clearly there's some exception or loophole.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
According to information known at the time and later leaked by WikiLeaks, it was likely because Sen. Bernie Sanders' campaign was a victim of collusion between the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC corporation. And if you read the (remarkable but predictably underreported) DNC lawsuit (CAROL WILDING et al. v DNC SERVICES CORPORATION, d/b/a DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL COMMITTEE and DEBORAH âoeDEBBIEâ WASSERMAN SCHULTZ), you'll understand why voting in party primaries is a waste of time. Consider what the DNC corporation's lawyer, Bruce Spiva, said about how that party could have picked a standard bearer (http://jampac.us/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/042517cw2.pdf pages 36-37):
There's no obligation for them to pay attention to your primary "votes" and you, Court, keep your nose out of our corporate business. I doubt any court would have told a corporation how to pick its representatives here anyhow, but the lawsuit was worth mounting even though it was likely to lose.
I don't want anyone to have to run YouTube's nonfree Javascript, so either look elsewhere for clips of "Redacted Tonight" (one of the few TV shows to mention this lawsuit which, uncoincidentally, is very revealing of the Democratic Party) or use youtube-dl to download https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZoSYC45cl6k and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V_fdBqISODQ for information on the class action lawsuit and how it ended.
Digital Citizen
Go to a cheap community college for the first two years while living at home. Then transfer to a four year college for the final two years and either work part time
I wonder how often this plan actually works in practice.
My own anecdotal experience with people who attempt this plan has been that they actually take 3+ years to muddle through the CC. Then, they still take another 4 years to finally finish the four year college that follows. So in practice, they don't really save that much and pay for the lost opportunity cost of starting their career younger.
I wouldn't be surprised if most people who are actually capable of doing the 2+2 plan are also capable of getting sufficient scholarships that they're better off just directly attending the four year school and finishing it early/on-time.
You are moving the goalposts. First you say "It can't be done" and now you are saying "It can't be done by unmotivated people that aren't willing to try very hard."
CC is easier than a 4Y university. So if they take 3 years to do 2 years at CC, then they are going to fail just as bad at a 4Y institution. You are talking about people that are going to do poorly in any situation. That is much more than a "funding" problem.
Why not? You can certainly vote away other people's.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
I can't name a prominent likeable anything without deep flaws. Apart from Edinburgh Castle.
On second thoughts, it's draughty as hell and it's in Scotland. Original motion stands.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Ex-felons can't vote, am I correct?
That depends on the state. Here is a map. Republican leaning states tend to have far more restrictions on felons voting, which makes sense since felons tend to vote Democratic.
So clearly there's some exception or loophole.
There are a lot of restrictions. For instance, poll taxes and literacy tests are banned. Identification requirements are contentious and tied up in the courts. I doubt if a "competency test" would go unchallenged.
Or the thought is "I live in an uncompetitive district/state, my vote doesn't matter anyway."
I read the internet for the articles.
At least half of the 16 or so primary opponents of Trump could have beaten Hillary. Although Trump has a large and very enthusiastic base, he has a personality almost as odious as Hillary has. The many people who voted against Trump (as distinguished from those who voted for Hillary) or who stayed home, because of his personality, could easily have voted for one of the following: Cruz, Carson, Kasich, Rubio, Fiorina, Gilmore, Santorum, Perry, Jindal, Pataki.
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Bond issues are frequently on ballots. They usually succeed. If you vote for them, you're voting away your freedom to keep your own money. Other examples of voting away your freedom are more subtle.
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I actually already unregistered to vote lol.
And yes, i would rather have secure texting via signal than voting in a rigged election system
Different name but that was how the UK did it before Maggie Thatcher's reign.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
There are talk radio stations, NPR, and (egads) Christian radio stations. That hardly constitutes a homogenized opinion source. Then there are the music radio stations, whose listeners change stations when the music stops, so they get no opinion from the radio.
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You misread the post you responded to. There is a difference between people born here and people brought here as infants.
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One characteristic of rights is that they still exist in the absence of other people. Your right to free speech cannot be violated if there is nobody to violate it.
In contrast, free medical care requires other people to provide it, therefor it is not a right.
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Hillary's personality was that of a stuck up b****h. Trump's personality is more of an entertainer, loud and flashy, and dependent on the day of the week. The voters might have voted for those other candidates in Trump's absence.
However, as far as a candidate which could beat Trump, especially given that they didn't, I don't see any stand out characteristics.
Trump was elected to clean house. To drain the swamp. To be a middle finger and outside candidate. Trump was elected as a man who knows how to make money, as one who would make us more profitable as a nation. Trump was chosen to unite the Republican party on its ideals. Trump was elected for his personality, to bring out voters. He was a very powerful player, and it isn't surprising he won.
Jill Stein had that outsider position, being from a third party. She also had being a woman on her list. If Trump hadn't run, there is a possibility that Jill Stein might have won just to give Hillary the finger.
Ben Carson was an outside candidate. He was also one of the more openly religously if I remembered correctly. This is what got him on the republican ticket. And he might have won if he didn't bow out, simply for being an outsider which was not Trump, and not Hillary, but was one who ran as a Republican. Otherwise Carson didn't have much going for him. Not much against him, but not much for him either.
Bernie's self proclaimed socialist position likely did him in. However he had a lot of potentially good ideas he was pitching. He just didn't have the other half of the combo,...
If Hillary had been elected, we'd be in a land war in Syria right now, possibly with proxy forces from Russia on the opposite side.
The Globalists are hellbent on a gas pipeline across Syria to compete with Russian energy interests.
That part of the Constitution was drafted by a dyslexic. It was supposed to read 'The right to arm bears.' The travesty of Yellowstone was never meant to happen. The bears should still be the ones running the show there.
Write and mail a letter. Use a telephone. You don't have to have your nervous systems fused together to keep in touch.
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3 years at a 2 year CC comes down to working full time, or at least 32 hours. To pay for living expenses, and for books, and whatever else isn't covered by financial aid. A scholarship to a 4 year college likely means a part time job for a little spending money, and maybe living in a dorm or such.
As chair of one of the biggest democracy groups in the UK, it pains me to say it.
The average margin of victory is ~100,000. That means you have a 1 in 100,000 of affecting 1 seat. As long as enough people vote to give your candidate a chance, your vote is that worthless.
I haven't voted in 10 years and was recently taken off the register. I could probably live without texting, but the choice is clear.
There's more than one elective office at stake. Vote for Representative and Senator. Vote in state, county, and local elections. Vote for school budgets, or whatever else is happening. Some elections do turn on a single vote.
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Trump doesn't insult broad swaths of Americans? He called New Hampshire a drug infested den. To the president of Mexico for fuck's sake.
Trump is a sociopathic asshole who's only nice when it benefits HIM. He's been like this for at least the past 5 decades, and nothing will ever change that.
~X~
The protection of the President has improved for obvious reasons.
Since your post implies that you have some sort of moral standard by which you determine that Trump is worse than JFK, it's clear that your education is lacking. The males of the political Kennedy family were, among other things, rapists. Do some research.
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Passing the Cisco certs and posting them on your LinkedIn absolutely does get recruiters calling you about much higher paying jobs than the $30K you're talking about. My income today is four times as much as it was five years ago.
Almost passing Cisco hasn't done much for you, but studying a bit more and passing, so you have the cert, and putting it on your LinkedIn DOES work.
> Working full time and taking the minimum fulltime hours for classes meant I was not fully prepared.
Most of my Cisco study was listening to YouTube videos in the car. I was already spending that time driving, so it didn't take any extra time to study that way. I also did some hands-on labs, but most of my study time was listening while driving. I achieved multiple Cisco certifications that way.
> You do know the number of companies willing to pay for a six figure paycheck is relatively low right now, right?
Based on the things I did, the items I put on my resume, when I last switched jobs there was a bidding war for me. Multiple offers over $90K - for what's on my resume.
> Do not think that because you managed to beat the odds, that your success is the norm.
It's not luck and it's not because I'm special, the companies looked at my resume. The result of the items on my resume is multiple offers over $90K. Most other people on Slashdot would get similar results if they put together a similar resume, by doing the same things I did. That includes listening to YouTube videos in order to get Cisco, Microsoft, and CompTIA certifications, and then based on those certifications, getting college credit. It's a recipe that works.
Let's apply a 1 cent tax on every text message, and we'll see if that motivates you to get involved in democracy.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
He is going to win again. There is zero competition from the left and all of the factors that got him elected in the first place still need to be done...
Can you name any prominent likable Democrats without deep flaws?
The guy I'd like to see run, provided Trump runs for re-election and actually looks strong, would be Senator Al Franken. He's not an moron, and actually grasps how to talk to voters that don't reside on the coasts.
I wouldn't mind Howard Dean running. My only reservations for Bernie Sanders running is that I consider him "damaged goods", like Hillary Clinton, and they're both too old.
There is no America. There is no democracy. There is only IBM and AT&T and DuPont, Dow, General Electric, and Exxon
No, you can't, Again illusion.
Get paid under the table.
...DUH! They're not the brightest bulbs in the box after all......
Wait just a second here. Are miniskirts back in fashion again and I missed it?
Some fashions, like the abrupt dawn of eternal September and bell bottom jeans you figure are a once-in-a-lifetime freak event.
But no, eternal September is baaaaack.
Dialogue with the governed: cronyism.
Failure to dialogue with the governed: deep state.
Heads I win, tails you lose.
Not quite eternal September, but close, yet for some reason we seem to have skipped a month.
Now, I need to run outside immediately and check me out some bell-bottomed miniskirts.
You sound like a marketing guy for a college.
CompTIA, really? Are you actually suggesting spending money on an A+ cert? That draws between $16,000 to $20,000 around here, and like the Cisco cert, had to be renewed regularly.
That is another problem with the Cisco certs. They gave them expirations after I failed mine. So it makes it that much harder to stack them.
At $30,000 annually, budgetting for whatever it takes to get my foot in the door is a challenge. I'm looking at needing $30,000 in savings to afford to be able to leave the job I have, first months rent or a down payment, car's about to fall apart and won't last for a job outside of town, etc. Its going to take more than three years, so I'll shoot for those cisco certs at the end of three years.
Because everyone is a gunsmith.
Considering how children have been (un)educated the past 30+ years, since the "age of political correctness" it doesn't surprise me ONE BIT! Kids today, into their 20's & 30's have become nothing more than 4 second attention span morons, glued to their smartphones, never put them down, would have a heart attack if the stupid battery were to die in the middle of taking a selfie. They have NOT been educated as to the greatness than is the American experience. Before the United States was founded, NO nation on this earth, had it's people be free. Every nation was ruled by a King, Queen, dictator. EVERYTHING was "owned" by whomever was in charge. You could not do as you wished, without the consent of the "ruler". Then, escaping the tyranny of the British empire, people came here, set up a rule of government where the people would rule themselves with laws based on the principal that people should live in accordance to their choice, to be able to do with the fruits of their labors, as they saw fit. Hell, the pilgrims even toyed with collectivism (socialism) and damn near starved to death, had it not been for the indians, and the first thanksgiving. We set up the government, to be ruled by the people (now, we can argue all day long how far off track it is now, but that is besides the point). This 240+ year experiment of FREEDOM was never known until the 1700's. If it is such a bad idea, why do so many flee their nations to come here? Why have so many died, by oppressive governments, who went so far as to build walls to keep their people from leaving? Kids today willingly (adults too) give up their freedoms every time they turn on their bloody phones! They don't understand the rights, and responsibilities that come with being a citizen. To them, the important things are tweets, likes and instagram.
Well yea, why is that so hard to understand ? i mean i know america is the center of the flat earth and all that and lobbies of the free world, bombing the ass out of the ground til it shits terrorists all across the planet and Trump is the answer cos he's the first one who might have a chance at having Korea detonate an actual nuke for real but how was hillary a real choice in a jock society, or in any other for that matter, right on the tsunami of global anti-establishment but lets get the bigger picture .. why is that hard to understand, i havent had THE RIGHT to vote in almost 12 years, simply cos i dont ask it back, i could have had it back for years now, all dues are paid and all sentence LONG gone in full (wasnt long but all the same i was removed from the register, standard practice i guess) And i have no idea why i would . I don't see anyone i want to vote FOR, only against ... and anti-votes tend to be lousy votes ... so ... texting gets more out of life and certainle gets more satisfaction
than voting
so why is that so hard to understand (im 44 btw and i wasnt born a criminal but it seems ever since then i am one, i might as well have started over straight out after only six months, they had to scrap to get enough to get me in actually but that's irrelevant to the post)
what's their reason to ? what will change if they do ?
there you go, can i have the 1million for solving the unsolvable now?
Free speech was meant to be free for all... how can anyone grow up in a nanny state ?
Hillary's personality was that of a stuck up b****h.
In other words, she's a woman who is smarter and more successful than you. She might be a stuck up bitch, but you're a whiny little one.
Only crack the nuts that crack. You don't put the ones that don't crack in the sack.
Nope. I know plenty of women more successful than me. Hillary is just stupid, as shown by most of her comments and outbursts following Trump's nomination. Wouldn't vote for her now if somebody paid me billions.
No. Trump did. Please try to keep up.
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
> At $30,000 annually, budgetting for whatever it takes to get my foot in the door is a challenge.
I been absolutely understand that! I've been there.
Let me say again - I've been there. And I found the path from there to here. A few years later I'm making more than three times that much. My take home income is four times what it was five years ago.
If someone making $350,000 in this field told me the recipe they followed, I would listen carefully. I wouldn't dismiss what they say, acting like they don't know what they are talking about - they are making three times as much as me, so I'd want to know exactly how they did it.
> so I'll shoot for those cisco certs at the end of three years.
Sounds reasonable, and in the meantime when the mood strikes you, you can prepare by watching YouTube videos or read a book you got on eBay for 99 cents.
>. the Cisco certs. They gave them expirations after I failed mine. So it makes it that much harder to stack them.
The Cisco certs do expire after a few years UNLESS you stack them, or meet other criteria to keep your knowledge up to date. That's okay - today you can say you achieved CCNP in 2012. Whether the cert has expired or not, you did achieve it. I would renew it (by getting another Cisco cert) if you plan to work in networking, or if your employer pays for the exam. If you're not directly working in networking, and your company or school won't pay for it, maybe there is no need to renew it. It's main value is to get you that first and second "good" job anyway. Once you're the CIO of one company, the next company isn't going to care whether your CCNA is fresh or not.
> CompTIA, really? Are you actually suggesting spending money on an A+ cert?
I actually didn't say A+, but let's use that example of one that is common and therefore less valuable. (I have Network+, Linux+ and Security+, because my school chose those as final exams). But you wanted to talk about A+, so let's do that.
A great investment in a stock or fund is one that has a 20% annual return. The very best, luckiest investments might average 100% annual return over five years. What is the return on investment for A+. One author criticized A+ saying that it only increased earnings by $3,000 / year. I'll play along with the critic. The exam costs $300. If a $300 investment returns $3,000 / year, that's a 1000% return! Hell yes I recommend ANY investment with 1000% annual return!
Voting != Democracy
Casteism
Some, but very rarely, and even for an election where your vote theoretically will actually count, it's hard to be motivated when your district has been intentionally gerrymandered in such a way to ensure that one particular party will always win.
Karma: Terrifying (mostly affected by atrocities you've committed)
and we won't have this problem.
Dirk Lannister out.
I completely disagree with that statement, given the current economic system we have in place.
UBI is a fantasy unless we first reach a post-capitalist economy where the labor required for all of our basic needs is fully automated. Then you can start talking about taking the revenue generated by the robots and automation and issuing it back out to citizens.
As it stands right now? You can't implement a UBI without it amounting to yet another "rob from the rich to give to the poor" scheme. Because where is the money going to come from that's paid back out? Governments don't generate income. They tax people to get money to redistribute.
As it stands right now? You can't implement a UBI without it amounting to yet another "rob from the rich to give to the poor" scheme.
The poor do the work, and the rich profit from it while the poor suffer. This is a "take the profits made possible by the poor and give them to the poor" scheme.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
In contrast, free medical care requires other people to provide it, therefor it is not a right.
Because everyone is a gunsmith.
Your point? The 2nd Amendment says that you have the right to own and carry a gun, not that anyone owes you a gun. There is no tax-funded subsidy to ensure that everyone has access to a weapon regardless of ability to pay. If you want one it's up to you to acquire it at your own expense. Medical care is no different. You have the right to accept medical care, when care is available, and others have the right to provide care to you if they choose—but no one owes you medical care any more than they owe you a gun.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
Yeah, I'd totally take financial advice from you.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."