What I see here is clearly the major metro areas went overwhelmingly blue. As a conservative friend mentioned, if nukes went off, obliterating 5-mile circles around the center of the largest 10 US cities, the Democratic party would never win another election.
I don't care how many Unicorns and Rainbows exist in your little world, sometimes war IS necessary.
Bush I precisely followed the mandate issued to him by the UN (and begged by the Arab neighborhood): kick Iraq out of Kuwait. And the result? A destabilized Iraq, Saddam Hussein perfectly willing to spend his oil wealth on whatever hurt the US (I don't believe he'd actively courted AQ).
In the words of your link, in 2003: Hans Blix: "Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptanceâ"not even todayâ"of the disarmament, which was demanded of it and which it needs to carry out to win the confidence of the world and to live in peace."[123] Among other things he noted that 1,000 short tons (910 t) of chemical agent were unaccounted for, information on Iraq's VX nerve agent program was missing, and that "no convincing evidence" was presented for the destruction of 8,500 litres (1,900 imp gal; 2,200 US gal) of anthrax that had been declared.
Simply, legally, the end of GW I was a ceasefire, not a surrender. The terms of that ceasefire were broken many ways.
Drink the Kool Aide all you like - the idea the Bush II had some sort of daddy-fulfillment issues is straight out of puerile Leftist websites. Congrats, you're the Left's equivalent of John Birch.
The offensive to topple Iraq was only "poison" to children that don't understand how geopolitics works. Simply whinging "give peace a chance" is juvenile and naive.
What did they have to say about lemonparty or two girls one cup?
I'm not being ironic or patronizing, I'm genuinely curious - you claim to be "one of those parents" allowing unfettered internet access, so one expects that almost inevitably they've run across graphic sex, fetishes, and extraordinary things that I (as a 46 year old) wish I could un-see. What's their take on it?
"No reason at all" is rather hyperbolic, unless one's a complete stump when it comes to geopolitics. Iraq was hardly some innocent bystander 'randomly mauled' as you imply: Here you have a revanchist state as a declared enemy of the US, wildly unpredictable, heavily armed, loaded with oil-money (barring sanctions), but diplomatically completely isolated. Sanctions were being violated, and even our allies (such as France and Germany) were crying about raising the sanctions regime. Personally, I thought it was a PERFECT moment for us to topple him, as well as a much-needed reminder of American martial power post-Mogadishu. I'll completely agree that the occupation and follow-on program for Iraq was *completely* botched, no question. But the invasion itself? Diplomatically useful and well-timed. (One might further point out that he was our client in the 1980s, so 'cleaning up that mess' was really our problem as well.)
Further, your caricature-understanding of the Tea Party is amusing, but mostly wrong. One suspects your opinion was largely formed from editorial cartoons or perhaps Sarah Palin "bits" on Saturday Night Live? The T.E.A. acronym is of post-facto coinage, as the party's foundation was (only) a direct reference to the Boston Tea Party, protesting illegal and excessive taxation.
" One side is logically, ideologically, demonstrably, objectively, significantly, subjectively worse."
You're right: democrats.
Last time I checked, "adults" recognize that you can't spend more than you make.
Oh wait, that's not what you meant? That's right, it's just tendentious partisan bullshit whether you say it or I do. Simply stomping your foot and saying "I'm right, you're a poopyhead" - while it's pretty much the level of discourse in congress today - really isn't a cogent argument.
Of course, one might similarly without references point to the fact that under Republicans systemic things get fixed that allow economies to improve enough that people can afford to elect democrats.
(shrug) But hey, whatever the hell you want - I think both parties are completely full of shit. The Democrats spend like there IS no checkbook, and Republicans actually fix nothing.
You reply is clever, in a sort of sophomoric way. The US isn't a "giant bucket of votes" - it never HAS been, was never intended to be, and - god willing - never will be.
Further, I said it's the MOST representative. Are you really asserting that the senate (where the CA senator needs something like 10x the votes a WY senator needs to get a seat) is more representative? Or that the electoral college is more representative? Note: I don't have any beef with the electoral system or the senate vote system - I'm just saying neither is particularly democratic, nor were they intended to be.
As far as Gerrymandering? Hell, the fact that there even is a North and South Dakota is PURE gerrymandering by anti-slavery activists.
The house - and I daresay ANY democratic system that allows updates of district lines without some sort of objective rules-system - has always been subject to gerrymandering. I can't imagine an ossified system would be better, but I can think of lots of relatively simple algorithms that could be better than the current "whoever's in charge gets to draw the lines" system.
Completely agree on the idea of a neutral algorithm....something mechanical and objective.
However, as know that both parties have massive self-ensuring industries, ANY proposal is going to be microscopically analyzed for immediate advantage in the next election cycle, and wildly supported by whatever party benefits (even if it's 0.000001%) and viciously attacked by the other.
Seriously, the whole fucking system is broken in so many ways.
And this, kids, is an exact example of the problem. Instead of pointing to the entrenched elites of BOTH parties (who are far more like each other than they are like either of the unwashed outside-the-beltway masses of either party), this AC poster blames: - George W Bush: certainly one of our least-competent presidents, in terms of foreign policy he worked with near-crystal clarity; I doubt he broke anyone's trust or betrayed them. This could be contrasted with Cold War presidents who worked to undermine elected governments around the world (Mossadegh, Allende, etc)...that might have a little more to do with 'destroying trust in the US'. - The Tea Party: contrary to the media-industry's tendentious portrayal of the Tea Party, as far as I can tell the Tea Party was formed to protest the ridiculous and ongoing government spending beyond its means. Its offense (aside from lining itself against the President, which automatically means they are painted as whatever fringe right-wing cause they can get to stick) is essentially being obstructionist - if there is nobody willing to start to be obstructionist when we cross $15 trillion in debt, then when?
The United States has outcompeted the rest of the first world with it's ostensibly-atrocious medical system for 50+ years...it doesn't seem like that's much of a problem in that context.
Re Gerrymandering - you know that this practice isn't limited to the US, but has been a part of American politics since about 1790? Really, that seems to the be the "talking point" for the media the last 45 days, it's one of those points that probably sounds very objective, but what the poster is doing is really attacking the House of Representatives. It's much like a fat white racist complaining about "the decline of the neighborhood" only when a black family moves next door. Of course the House happens to be a) the most democratically-elected branch of the US government, and b) controlled by the Republican party this cycle. It's amazing how nobody in the media was talking about the problem of Gerrymandering 2007-2009...I wonder why?
I'm not for an 'advanced' standard based solely on proprietary systems whose ownership is entirely held by a company whose licensing pricing makes Monster Cables blush in shame.
The horrible part of the design is that the orientation is something you can only tell with good eyes in clear light.
Why the hell you'd design a modern plug that way is beyond me.
Bias: fine, sometimes necessary. I might even say its a preferable simple-physical solution to requiring everything using the plug to have the extra few-cents' worth of circuitry to switch around the pin that's taking in power before it burns out your system completely. FAR simpler to have an L-shape or right triangle or SOMETHING that I can feel for in the dark and plug in without wrecking either my cable or the device.
SciAm has, by rather wide acclaim, gone in the shitter since the early 90's at least. I believe there was a management change at that time.
In any case, they went from a Science Reporting magazine, and a quite good one, to a Science Advocacy magazine that chose to take positions and defend them.
So, it's their money and their magazine - they can make that choice. I long since also agree that MY choice was going to be not to subscribe.
FWIW, I now am a delighted subscriber to Science News and have been since that time. Absolutely fantastic magazine - distills the cutting edge science issues/discoveries in a synopsis form that doesn't dumb them down at all. It's like "science breakthroughs newsletter" with then a couple of longer articles dealing with bigger subjects in a more in-depth fashion. I mean it sincerely when I say that they don't dumb them: I have no problem admitting there are some articles that I get a paragraph in and just say "whups, I can follow the generalities, but I don't have the specialized knowledge of that field to really even understand that."
...this is what happens when you have a President that makes your leg tingle.
Seriously, though, the press has ALWAYS done a better job covering Republican presidents, as their adversarial role is abundantly clear. Largely, Democratic presidents who ostensibly have the shared outlook, overall sympathies, if not outright vote of reporters (http://archive.mrc.org/biasbasics/biasbasics.asp), have been covered much more gently and with (dare I call it) an almost collaborationist approach.
As politics have become more strident and divisive, it seems like the press itself has found itself more stridently taking a side, with Fox on the Right, and everyone else on the Left.
How would you know? He had unnamed sources - some have asserted that in fact he was getting info from Hoover, who couldn't act overtly. The fact is, they were right. Your assertion that "he was just lucky" is itself a guess, and no more supportable factually than you claim his were.
Going public is a time- honored practice when the people responsible WILL NOT ACT. Snowden comes to mind. McCarthy didn't *start* by grandstanding - he tried to approach State and the President on these issues, and they were disregarded (him being a rather odious person probably had a lot to do with that).
Yes, precisely: Fuck you, I've got mine. I earned it.
1) My father worked at retail sales. Mother did clerical work in a factory office. We never had much money.
2) I went to a mediocre public high school. Worked hard, didn't party. Graduated with "B" average.
3) I won a scholarship for college from the local Lions club to the tune of $150/year - that was my total subsidy. I worked 30-40 hours a week during being a full-time college student at 2 jobs to pay for my school. I lived at home, driving a car I bought with my own money (as I'd worked since I was 14.) My parents did help me a couple of times with checks of about $500 total over 4 years of school.
Immediately started work after school as an intern, making shit-wages for 2 years, living at home and saving every penny.
I worked in Freight Forwarding as a clerk for 5+ years, until I got a good gig working for a foreign company here in the US.
For the first several years with that company, I was working 70+ hour weeks. My new wife at the time sat me down with a calendar and showed me the number of days I was leaving before she woke, and getting home after kids were to bed - ie useless husband. Fortunately, our marriage survived.
My parents passed, and left me and my siblings nothing but debt.
NOTHING I did was the result of entitlement, family wealth, or favoritism. Certainly there was some luck, no doubt there. But no, I don't accept your implication that somehow I'm a Bourbonesque lordling telling everyone else to eat cake. No, I don't agree that the unwashed masses have any entitled right to take MY money. I'd like very much to use MY hard-earned cash to improve MY kids' futures, not some poor kid. Crazy, right?
Most of the people living on welfare today made life choices that left them there. That's my fault?
Bad analogy, since much (not all) of what McCarthy said turned out in fact to be true. The State Department WAS rife with people who were in fact Communist sympathizers or active Soviet agents.
McCarthyism has become a cultural touchstone for 'witch hunt' but that little bit conveniently has been ignored/forgotten.
You lost me at your second sentence: "...Post-high-school education is becoming damn near unaffordable to all but the wealthy..."
More correct to say: "...Post-high-school education is becoming damn near unaffordable to the middle class, who are busily paying to educate the poor."
College prices have climbed at what, 4x the rate of inflation since the 1980s? Not coincidentally, this is concurrent with the tide of government money in the form of grants, aid, and most perniciously, loans.
Nota bene: I have four children. One is a junior at a small liberal arts college. One is a sophomore at one of the largest US state schools. The third is a high school senior now planning their post-secondary choice. (The fourth is merely 16 and a long way from deciding their college choices.) I only mention this to prove that I know what I'm talking about.
When my wife and I went to the U of MN 1986-1990, the cost was, as I recall, about $2300/year. This year, it's about $23,000/year. I could work a part-time job 20-30 hours a week and pay for my own college. That is flatly impossible now.
I'm absolutely convinced that the tide of government money into education has been nothing more than a giant subsidy to educational institutions and teachers for 30+ years, the most reliably-Democratic-voting constituency; it has allowed these institutions to bloat their tuitions beyond all reason and yet they remain ostensibly 'affordable'...as long as you accept that you are on government largesse.
My wife (a bookkeeper) has helped numerous local families do their FAFSA applications: many of them at family incomes below $50,000/yr pay NOTHING (or a token amount, like $1000) for college at rather expensive local schools. My family, at only slightly double that income, gets nothing. Is that a fair system?
I'll be clear: I don't want more aid - I don't want government aid, period. I would however very much like to keep more of my income (that is, in small part, being used to subsidize other people's kids going to school) to pay for my own kids' education.
...in which a raid is only complete when the Guild Leader sends an apology note to the instance's main boss for their unannounced intrusion of his secret lair, their slaughter of his guards, and a compensatory money-order for the treasure they looted../facepalm.
To suggest there's 'no trace of war' in prehistory is a tautology.
There's also no trace of writing, architecture, medicine, science, astronomy, whatever you want to say that separates us from upright apes.
To suggest that it's the introduction of patriarchy and private property that brought war about, you have to logically ALSO say it was patriarchy and private property that caused all those OTHER things about too.
(I think both are silly, but you're the one who made the logical assertion in the first place.)
So yeah, if you prefer to live as barely-conscious hominids eking out an opportunistic existence for their score-and-a-half years or so before dying to a predator or easily-treatable disease, you go ahead and blame patriarchy and private property for the world you live in...
Slashdot Mirror
It's where we are today.
Look at the great maps in http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2012/
Specifically, this one: http://www-personal.umich.edu/~mejn/election/2012/countycartpurple1024.png (county-level 2012 results by population)
What I see here is clearly the major metro areas went overwhelmingly blue.
As a conservative friend mentioned, if nukes went off, obliterating 5-mile circles around the center of the largest 10 US cities, the Democratic party would never win another election.
So you're saying that a country SHOULD go ahead and continue to spend more than it takes in, forever?
THAT'S BRILLIANT. Why didn't Keynes think of that?
With the intellectual power of such voters, how could we have gotten into such an economic mess?
I don't care how many Unicorns and Rainbows exist in your little world, sometimes war IS necessary.
Bush I precisely followed the mandate issued to him by the UN (and begged by the Arab neighborhood): kick Iraq out of Kuwait. And the result? A destabilized Iraq, Saddam Hussein perfectly willing to spend his oil wealth on whatever hurt the US (I don't believe he'd actively courted AQ).
In the words of your link, in 2003: Hans Blix: "Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptanceâ"not even todayâ"of the disarmament, which was demanded of it and which it needs to carry out to win the confidence of the world and to live in peace."[123] Among other things he noted that 1,000 short tons (910 t) of chemical agent were unaccounted for, information on Iraq's VX nerve agent program was missing, and that "no convincing evidence" was presented for the destruction of 8,500 litres (1,900 imp gal; 2,200 US gal) of anthrax that had been declared.
Simply, legally, the end of GW I was a ceasefire, not a surrender. The terms of that ceasefire were broken many ways.
Drink the Kool Aide all you like - the idea the Bush II had some sort of daddy-fulfillment issues is straight out of puerile Leftist websites. Congrats, you're the Left's equivalent of John Birch.
The offensive to topple Iraq was only "poison" to children that don't understand how geopolitics works. Simply whinging "give peace a chance" is juvenile and naive.
What did they have to say about lemonparty or two girls one cup?
I'm not being ironic or patronizing, I'm genuinely curious - you claim to be "one of those parents" allowing unfettered internet access, so one expects that almost inevitably they've run across graphic sex, fetishes, and extraordinary things that I (as a 46 year old) wish I could un-see. What's their take on it?
"No reason at all" is rather hyperbolic, unless one's a complete stump when it comes to geopolitics. Iraq was hardly some innocent bystander 'randomly mauled' as you imply: Here you have a revanchist state as a declared enemy of the US, wildly unpredictable, heavily armed, loaded with oil-money (barring sanctions), but diplomatically completely isolated. Sanctions were being violated, and even our allies (such as France and Germany) were crying about raising the sanctions regime.
Personally, I thought it was a PERFECT moment for us to topple him, as well as a much-needed reminder of American martial power post-Mogadishu. I'll completely agree that the occupation and follow-on program for Iraq was *completely* botched, no question. But the invasion itself? Diplomatically useful and well-timed. (One might further point out that he was our client in the 1980s, so 'cleaning up that mess' was really our problem as well.)
Further, your caricature-understanding of the Tea Party is amusing, but mostly wrong. One suspects your opinion was largely formed from editorial cartoons or perhaps Sarah Palin "bits" on Saturday Night Live? The T.E.A. acronym is of post-facto coinage, as the party's foundation was (only) a direct reference to the Boston Tea Party, protesting illegal and excessive taxation.
" One side is logically, ideologically, demonstrably, objectively, significantly, subjectively worse."
You're right: democrats.
Last time I checked, "adults" recognize that you can't spend more than you make.
Oh wait, that's not what you meant? That's right, it's just tendentious partisan bullshit whether you say it or I do. Simply stomping your foot and saying "I'm right, you're a poopyhead" - while it's pretty much the level of discourse in congress today - really isn't a cogent argument.
Of course, one might similarly without references point to the fact that under Republicans systemic things get fixed that allow economies to improve enough that people can afford to elect democrats.
(shrug)
But hey, whatever the hell you want - I think both parties are completely full of shit. The Democrats spend like there IS no checkbook, and Republicans actually fix nothing.
"big chunk" 10%?
Remember, during the Obamacare debate, the Democrats insisted that "30 million people are without health insurance".
Ironically, the CBO has estimated that the number of people remaining without insurance AFTER Obamacare is implemented is...31 million.
BRILLIANT!
You reply is clever, in a sort of sophomoric way.
The US isn't a "giant bucket of votes" - it never HAS been, was never intended to be, and - god willing - never will be.
Further, I said it's the MOST representative. Are you really asserting that the senate (where the CA senator needs something like 10x the votes a WY senator needs to get a seat) is more representative? Or that the electoral college is more representative? Note: I don't have any beef with the electoral system or the senate vote system - I'm just saying neither is particularly democratic, nor were they intended to be.
As far as Gerrymandering? Hell, the fact that there even is a North and South Dakota is PURE gerrymandering by anti-slavery activists.
The house - and I daresay ANY democratic system that allows updates of district lines without some sort of objective rules-system - has always been subject to gerrymandering. I can't imagine an ossified system would be better, but I can think of lots of relatively simple algorithms that could be better than the current "whoever's in charge gets to draw the lines" system.
Completely agree on the idea of a neutral algorithm....something mechanical and objective.
However, as know that both parties have massive self-ensuring industries, ANY proposal is going to be microscopically analyzed for immediate advantage in the next election cycle, and wildly supported by whatever party benefits (even if it's 0.000001%) and viciously attacked by the other.
Seriously, the whole fucking system is broken in so many ways.
You haven't apparently been listening.
It's a foundational point of politics that Conservatives have opposed Social Security forever.
And this, kids, is an exact example of the problem.
Instead of pointing to the entrenched elites of BOTH parties (who are far more like each other than they are like either of the unwashed outside-the-beltway masses of either party), this AC poster blames:
- George W Bush: certainly one of our least-competent presidents, in terms of foreign policy he worked with near-crystal clarity; I doubt he broke anyone's trust or betrayed them. This could be contrasted with Cold War presidents who worked to undermine elected governments around the world (Mossadegh, Allende, etc)...that might have a little more to do with 'destroying trust in the US'.
- The Tea Party: contrary to the media-industry's tendentious portrayal of the Tea Party, as far as I can tell the Tea Party was formed to protest the ridiculous and ongoing government spending beyond its means. Its offense (aside from lining itself against the President, which automatically means they are painted as whatever fringe right-wing cause they can get to stick) is essentially being obstructionist - if there is nobody willing to start to be obstructionist when we cross $15 trillion in debt, then when?
The United States has outcompeted the rest of the first world with it's ostensibly-atrocious medical system for 50+ years...it doesn't seem like that's much of a problem in that context.
Re Gerrymandering - you know that this practice isn't limited to the US, but has been a part of American politics since about 1790? Really, that seems to the be the "talking point" for the media the last 45 days, it's one of those points that probably sounds very objective, but what the poster is doing is really attacking the House of Representatives. It's much like a fat white racist complaining about "the decline of the neighborhood" only when a black family moves next door.
Of course the House happens to be
a) the most democratically-elected branch of the US government, and
b) controlled by the Republican party this cycle.
It's amazing how nobody in the media was talking about the problem of Gerrymandering 2007-2009...I wonder why?
...that socializing a major part of the US economy isn't easy?
Oh wait, that's probably not what you meant to say.
I'm all for advanced standards.
I'm not for an 'advanced' standard based solely on proprietary systems whose ownership is entirely held by a company whose licensing pricing makes Monster Cables blush in shame.
MicroUSB's orientation isn't the problem.
The horrible part of the design is that the orientation is something you can only tell with good eyes in clear light.
Why the hell you'd design a modern plug that way is beyond me.
Bias: fine, sometimes necessary. I might even say its a preferable simple-physical solution to requiring everything using the plug to have the extra few-cents' worth of circuitry to switch around the pin that's taking in power before it burns out your system completely. FAR simpler to have an L-shape or right triangle or SOMETHING that I can feel for in the dark and plug in without wrecking either my cable or the device.
...doesn't of course answer the IMPORTANT question: "should he have been stopped".
Government: yes
Growing % of the public (of the sub% that gives a shit about any news that doesn't have the Kardashians in it): No.
SciAm has, by rather wide acclaim, gone in the shitter since the early 90's at least. I believe there was a management change at that time.
In any case, they went from a Science Reporting magazine, and a quite good one, to a Science Advocacy magazine that chose to take positions and defend them.
So, it's their money and their magazine - they can make that choice.
I long since also agree that MY choice was going to be not to subscribe.
FWIW, I now am a delighted subscriber to Science News and have been since that time. Absolutely fantastic magazine - distills the cutting edge science issues/discoveries in a synopsis form that doesn't dumb them down at all. It's like "science breakthroughs newsletter" with then a couple of longer articles dealing with bigger subjects in a more in-depth fashion. I mean it sincerely when I say that they don't dumb them: I have no problem admitting there are some articles that I get a paragraph in and just say "whups, I can follow the generalities, but I don't have the specialized knowledge of that field to really even understand that."
...this is what happens when you have a President that makes your leg tingle.
Seriously, though, the press has ALWAYS done a better job covering Republican presidents, as their adversarial role is abundantly clear. Largely, Democratic presidents who ostensibly have the shared outlook, overall sympathies, if not outright vote of reporters (http://archive.mrc.org/biasbasics/biasbasics.asp), have been covered much more gently and with (dare I call it) an almost collaborationist approach.
As politics have become more strident and divisive, it seems like the press itself has found itself more stridently taking a side, with Fox on the Right, and everyone else on the Left.
How would you know? He had unnamed sources - some have asserted that in fact he was getting info from Hoover, who couldn't act overtly. The fact is, they were right. Your assertion that "he was just lucky" is itself a guess, and no more supportable factually than you claim his were.
Going public is a time- honored practice when the people responsible WILL NOT ACT. Snowden comes to mind. McCarthy didn't *start* by grandstanding - he tried to approach State and the President on these issues, and they were disregarded (him being a rather odious person probably had a lot to do with that).
Yes, precisely: Fuck you, I've got mine. I earned it.
1) My father worked at retail sales. Mother did clerical work in a factory office. We never had much money.
2) I went to a mediocre public high school. Worked hard, didn't party. Graduated with "B" average.
3) I won a scholarship for college from the local Lions club to the tune of $150/year - that was my total subsidy. I worked 30-40 hours a week during being a full-time college student at 2 jobs to pay for my school. I lived at home, driving a car I bought with my own money (as I'd worked since I was 14.) My parents did help me a couple of times with checks of about $500 total over 4 years of school.
Immediately started work after school as an intern, making shit-wages for 2 years, living at home and saving every penny.
I worked in Freight Forwarding as a clerk for 5+ years, until I got a good gig working for a foreign company here in the US.
For the first several years with that company, I was working 70+ hour weeks.
My new wife at the time sat me down with a calendar and showed me the number of days I was leaving before she woke, and getting home after kids were to bed - ie useless husband. Fortunately, our marriage survived.
My parents passed, and left me and my siblings nothing but debt.
NOTHING I did was the result of entitlement, family wealth, or favoritism. Certainly there was some luck, no doubt there.
But no, I don't accept your implication that somehow I'm a Bourbonesque lordling telling everyone else to eat cake. No, I don't agree that the unwashed masses have any entitled right to take MY money. I'd like very much to use MY hard-earned cash to improve MY kids' futures, not some poor kid. Crazy, right?
Most of the people living on welfare today made life choices that left them there. That's my fault?
...that once again, porn will lead the way in the application of this technology to the internet.
Bad analogy, since much (not all) of what McCarthy said turned out in fact to be true. The State Department WAS rife with people who were in fact Communist sympathizers or active Soviet agents.
McCarthyism has become a cultural touchstone for 'witch hunt' but that little bit conveniently has been ignored/forgotten.
Read Venona or Mitrokhin.
You lost me at your second sentence: "...Post-high-school education is becoming damn near unaffordable to all but the wealthy..."
More correct to say: "...Post-high-school education is becoming damn near unaffordable to the middle class, who are busily paying to educate the poor."
College prices have climbed at what, 4x the rate of inflation since the 1980s? Not coincidentally, this is concurrent with the tide of government money in the form of grants, aid, and most perniciously, loans.
Nota bene: I have four children. One is a junior at a small liberal arts college. One is a sophomore at one of the largest US state schools. The third is a high school senior now planning their post-secondary choice. (The fourth is merely 16 and a long way from deciding their college choices.) I only mention this to prove that I know what I'm talking about.
When my wife and I went to the U of MN 1986-1990, the cost was, as I recall, about $2300/year. This year, it's about $23,000/year. I could work a part-time job 20-30 hours a week and pay for my own college. That is flatly impossible now.
I'm absolutely convinced that the tide of government money into education has been nothing more than a giant subsidy to educational institutions and teachers for 30+ years, the most reliably-Democratic-voting constituency; it has allowed these institutions to bloat their tuitions beyond all reason and yet they remain ostensibly 'affordable'...as long as you accept that you are on government largesse.
My wife (a bookkeeper) has helped numerous local families do their FAFSA applications: many of them at family incomes below $50,000/yr pay NOTHING (or a token amount, like $1000) for college at rather expensive local schools. My family, at only slightly double that income, gets nothing.
Is that a fair system?
I'll be clear: I don't want more aid - I don't want government aid, period.
I would however very much like to keep more of my income (that is, in small part, being used to subsidize other people's kids going to school) to pay for my own kids' education.
...in which a raid is only complete when the Guild Leader sends an apology note to the instance's main boss for their unannounced intrusion of his secret lair, their slaughter of his guards, and a compensatory money-order for the treasure they looted.. /facepalm.
To suggest there's 'no trace of war' in prehistory is a tautology.
There's also no trace of writing, architecture, medicine, science, astronomy, whatever you want to say that separates us from upright apes.
To suggest that it's the introduction of patriarchy and private property that brought war about, you have to logically ALSO say it was patriarchy and private property that caused all those OTHER things about too.
(I think both are silly, but you're the one who made the logical assertion in the first place.)
So yeah, if you prefer to live as barely-conscious hominids eking out an opportunistic existence for their score-and-a-half years or so before dying to a predator or easily-treatable disease, you go ahead and blame patriarchy and private property for the world you live in...