we're forcing you to take part in civilization. It's not different than being forced to get vaccinations or a license to drive. Your actions do not happen in a vacuum. When you deny people access to health care you make them desperate. Dangerous. Sooner or later a rabble rouser will come along, organize them, and turn them against you and everyone else for his own profit using populist rhetoric to cover his true motives. This has happened again and again. Hitler. Stalin. Mussolini. Mao. They're just the best known examples.
Civilization doesn't get to be an option. Take care of everybody or be taken 'care' of by them. You abandon the poor at your peril.
Genocide is nothing new. It's roots are like most things economic. The Germans needed money to lift their economy despite of the sanctions and fuel a war machine suitable for empire building. The Jews happen to have enough money for that and being an insular people were easy enough to put to the sword for the purpose of taking their wealth.
Take any awful thing that's been done in history and it's always about money when all's said and done. If you want to stop Genocide, oppression and everything else that's bad it's simple really: take care of your poor, don't screw them over. Otherwise somebody's gonna come along and mobilize them.
and that's fine and dandy. But it doesn't solve problems. The left isn't saying government will take care of everybody, we're saying _everybody_ will take care of everybody. Government just happens to be what we named the structure required to do it. We could also call it "Civilization". We're not lying. It's the only way out from the coming Dark Ages as the Uber wealthy seek to consolidate their power. Maybe it'll fail, but I know this: we'll be no worse off for the failure and a lot worse off for not trying.
the problem is that folks have to ask for money to get medicine they need to _live_.
And I know this: Charity doesn't work. In the entire recorded history of mankind charity has never made so much as a dent in the poor's lot. Charity makes people feel better. It does not solve problems. If it did poverty wouldn't be a thing, and folks wouldn't be begging for medicine on a website.
based on what they're trained in; and they're trained in whatever's cheapest. That's why mainframes are dying. It's expensive to train, especially if you're doing it in India. That's the same reason Java took off.
The tech is only part of the cost. It's not even the biggest part. Employees are always the big cost and anything that drives down those costs will be weighted heavily.
with a private company. This is just shaking down the poor so they don't have to raise taxes, just like red light cameras (which you won't find in well to do neighborhoods or on freeways those same well to do use).
Give us single payer health care and you take away 90% of the justification of mandatory car insurance. Trotting out kids who got hit by a car and couldn't pay medical bills is how they got it through. But again, the point isn't fairness, it's shaking down the poor.
are the Elephant in the Room. Or "Snowflakes". Or Tax and Spend Liberals. Or whatever pejorative you want to use for people who get help but don't strictly speaking need it to survive.
Now, if you're clever and can use google to prove the Welfare Queen is a myth. But that myth _feels_ right. It also absolves us from paying for those Tax and Spend Liberals single payer healthcare system. After all, if you take money from me to pay for some guy's medical bills aren't you just stealing from me? Let's not forget taxes are taken at the barrel of a gun (you go to jail if you don't pay). Again, I could waste an hour of your time explaining why that's all bunk but it would be plaining to the wrong side of the brain. It wouldn't feel good like those myths do.
Until somebody can come up with a bumper sticker that shuts down Welfare Queen and Tax and Spend Liberal we're not getting single payer. They myths are just too pervasive. Anyone wanna give it a crack?
they already took out the folks just randomly asking for money. It's 90% of _medical_ campaigns that fail. But hey, you're uninformed rant probably made you feel better about not providing those 90% with life saving medical care and food/shelter while they're too sick to work, right?
and it hasn't for thousands of years of recorded history. Hell, you can see that in literally 2/3 of the world where second and third world conditions dominate. When the right say that charities and churches will step up they know they're lying. It's something they tell their base so they don't feel so bad about abandoning people to slow death.
on the minorities without being too obvious about it. Crap like this is how segregation is enforced. I wish I was joking/trolling, but a good buddy of mine is both black and a truck driver and the stories. Not from the deep South (they wouldn't send him there) but from places like California & Utah you'd think would be cut and dry.
is Paltrow's character in the Ironman movies is a no-nonsense type, so folks have come to think of her as such (since it's what 90% of us know her from). Seeing her buy into this new age (junk science? I wouldn't even call it that) nonsense makes for an amusing cognitive dissonance. Sure, the more clever chaps know she's just scamming rich women but there's plenty that are just scratching their heads.
This is how we do it. We don't just blindly enforce the laws. We do the same thing with Jury Nullification.
Our political system is a mess because it was designed from the ground up by wealthy landowners to protect their interests to the detriment of the farmers working the land. It's why we have a Senate/House instead of a parliament. These sorts of distortions are what you get when you have a system built on oligarchy trying to function as a democracy. Unless you can get support to rebuild our institutions you're gonna have to live with these compromises.
responsible for our problems. But they do crowd us out of the job market. Not the ones here picking fruit, but you'd have to be a fool to work in tech and not see that 80% of the jobs are folks here on work visas or folks who transitioned from a work visa to citizenship. Yes, that helps the economy, but not _my_ economy. I don't get a piece of that because I'm a worker. I don't benefit from the wage suppression that results. And I don't get cheaper prices from wage suppression. Supply and Demand doesn't work that way. Especially when my budget is mostly comprised of necessities like food, shelter, transportation and child rearing.
You're right to say we could solve our problems _and_ have immigration that benefited the country, but we won't. It's not politically feasible to solve them. We need to tax the wealthy to fund education, fund social programs and safety nets and subsidize worker programs. All things that would drive up wages and costs for the well to do. So I'll take the one thing that _might_ be politically feasible: stopping immigration. Yeah, it's probably bad for the overall economy, but it's good for _my_ economy. And after 30 years of declining wages and rising college costs I'll take what little I (might) get.
on shitty minimum wage jobs. For one thing you haven't completely destroyed your tech industry with cheap work visas (though your right wing is trying). You also have universal healthcare and a much more robust safety net. And a better higher education system. Your entire system is much better suited to deal with these changes than our puritanical, "I got mine f-u" one.
when all the chains that aren't $30/meal are running them and you don't have a choice because you just gotta eat and you're too tired after 12-16 hours of shift work and the gig economy.
The moral of the story is things can always get worse. Especially if you let them, and we do.
I've had family who sorta tried (illness in the family made it impossible for the single parent to work) and you get about $200/mo if you're destitute with a note from a doctor saying you're a full time caregiver for a sick relative. There's no housing assistance to be had either. What little there is has 8 year wait lists.
I don't know if the dole ever existed in America, but I can sure as hell tell you it doesn't now. While I'm on the subject there's no such thing as welfare queens either. UBI would be nice, but I don't see us getting it because of the aforementioned welfare queens. That myth's got legs and no amount of evidence seems to kill it.
everyone else, sure. But not those guys. Well, you could try violence, but every time it's been done it's just ending with a different bunch of yahoos. I guess we could try worker solidarity, but nobody wants to pay for the other guy to have stuff. Lazy good for 'nothin's...
but not a dime for the various cable companies that took billions in state and federal cash and didn't deliver promised network upgrades. Sounds about right. This guy just didn't grease the right palms.
but the only way left wing policies (like fair treatment across race) get traction is through humor. Our media is owned by very rich, very right wing men who have a stake in keeping racism alive and well since it divides the working class.
by inflation. They're not getting adjusted. And then there's things like Food Stamps & housing programs. I don't use them directly, but they pump money into a sector of the economy that spends 100% of their income. Putting more money in Warren Buffetts pocket doesn't help me. He doesn't spend it. I need it in the hands of folks who spend so they can buy what I'm selling. I need a vibrant middle class.
And don't get me started on cuts to education, especially college. Anyone who tells you that college costs too much because dorms are nicer is lying through their teeth or has been listening to somebody who is. We slashed federal subsidies for public universities in the 90s (thanks Clinton) and it's more than quadrupled the out of pocket cost. Of couse the companies don't care because they can just use the H1-B visa program to get the talent they need cheap while complaining about dumb Americans.
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we're forcing you to take part in civilization. It's not different than being forced to get vaccinations or a license to drive. Your actions do not happen in a vacuum. When you deny people access to health care you make them desperate. Dangerous. Sooner or later a rabble rouser will come along, organize them, and turn them against you and everyone else for his own profit using populist rhetoric to cover his true motives. This has happened again and again. Hitler. Stalin. Mussolini. Mao. They're just the best known examples.
Civilization doesn't get to be an option. Take care of everybody or be taken 'care' of by them. You abandon the poor at your peril.
Genocide is nothing new. It's roots are like most things economic. The Germans needed money to lift their economy despite of the sanctions and fuel a war machine suitable for empire building. The Jews happen to have enough money for that and being an insular people were easy enough to put to the sword for the purpose of taking their wealth.
Take any awful thing that's been done in history and it's always about money when all's said and done. If you want to stop Genocide, oppression and everything else that's bad it's simple really: take care of your poor, don't screw them over. Otherwise somebody's gonna come along and mobilize them.
and that's fine and dandy. But it doesn't solve problems. The left isn't saying government will take care of everybody, we're saying _everybody_ will take care of everybody. Government just happens to be what we named the structure required to do it. We could also call it "Civilization". We're not lying. It's the only way out from the coming Dark Ages as the Uber wealthy seek to consolidate their power. Maybe it'll fail, but I know this: we'll be no worse off for the failure and a lot worse off for not trying.
the problem is that folks have to ask for money to get medicine they need to _live_.
And I know this: Charity doesn't work. In the entire recorded history of mankind charity has never made so much as a dent in the poor's lot. Charity makes people feel better. It does not solve problems. If it did poverty wouldn't be a thing, and folks wouldn't be begging for medicine on a website.
based on what they're trained in; and they're trained in whatever's cheapest. That's why mainframes are dying. It's expensive to train, especially if you're doing it in India. That's the same reason Java took off.
The tech is only part of the cost. It's not even the biggest part. Employees are always the big cost and anything that drives down those costs will be weighted heavily.
with a private company. This is just shaking down the poor so they don't have to raise taxes, just like red light cameras (which you won't find in well to do neighborhoods or on freeways those same well to do use).
Give us single payer health care and you take away 90% of the justification of mandatory car insurance. Trotting out kids who got hit by a car and couldn't pay medical bills is how they got it through. But again, the point isn't fairness, it's shaking down the poor.
I'm guessing the Parliament feels a bit like a kid who hasn't studied and got a snow day right now.
are the Elephant in the Room. Or "Snowflakes". Or Tax and Spend Liberals. Or whatever pejorative you want to use for people who get help but don't strictly speaking need it to survive.
Now, if you're clever and can use google to prove the Welfare Queen is a myth. But that myth _feels_ right. It also absolves us from paying for those Tax and Spend Liberals single payer healthcare system. After all, if you take money from me to pay for some guy's medical bills aren't you just stealing from me? Let's not forget taxes are taken at the barrel of a gun (you go to jail if you don't pay). Again, I could waste an hour of your time explaining why that's all bunk but it would be plaining to the wrong side of the brain. It wouldn't feel good like those myths do.
Until somebody can come up with a bumper sticker that shuts down Welfare Queen and Tax and Spend Liberal we're not getting single payer. They myths are just too pervasive. Anyone wanna give it a crack?
they already took out the folks just randomly asking for money. It's 90% of _medical_ campaigns that fail. But hey, you're uninformed rant probably made you feel better about not providing those 90% with life saving medical care and food/shelter while they're too sick to work, right?
and it hasn't for thousands of years of recorded history. Hell, you can see that in literally 2/3 of the world where second and third world conditions dominate. When the right say that charities and churches will step up they know they're lying. It's something they tell their base so they don't feel so bad about abandoning people to slow death.
on the minorities without being too obvious about it. Crap like this is how segregation is enforced. I wish I was joking/trolling, but a good buddy of mine is both black and a truck driver and the stories. Not from the deep South (they wouldn't send him there) but from places like California & Utah you'd think would be cut and dry.
and solidarity. Individuals don't have the power to effect meaningful change in the face of large organizations like mega corps. Join or Die.
is Paltrow's character in the Ironman movies is a no-nonsense type, so folks have come to think of her as such (since it's what 90% of us know her from). Seeing her buy into this new age (junk science? I wouldn't even call it that) nonsense makes for an amusing cognitive dissonance. Sure, the more clever chaps know she's just scamming rich women but there's plenty that are just scratching their heads.
Are you Batman?
This is how we do it. We don't just blindly enforce the laws. We do the same thing with Jury Nullification.
Our political system is a mess because it was designed from the ground up by wealthy landowners to protect their interests to the detriment of the farmers working the land. It's why we have a Senate/House instead of a parliament. These sorts of distortions are what you get when you have a system built on oligarchy trying to function as a democracy. Unless you can get support to rebuild our institutions you're gonna have to live with these compromises.
responsible for our problems. But they do crowd us out of the job market. Not the ones here picking fruit, but you'd have to be a fool to work in tech and not see that 80% of the jobs are folks here on work visas or folks who transitioned from a work visa to citizenship. Yes, that helps the economy, but not _my_ economy. I don't get a piece of that because I'm a worker. I don't benefit from the wage suppression that results. And I don't get cheaper prices from wage suppression. Supply and Demand doesn't work that way. Especially when my budget is mostly comprised of necessities like food, shelter, transportation and child rearing.
You're right to say we could solve our problems _and_ have immigration that benefited the country, but we won't. It's not politically feasible to solve them. We need to tax the wealthy to fund education, fund social programs and safety nets and subsidize worker programs. All things that would drive up wages and costs for the well to do. So I'll take the one thing that _might_ be politically feasible: stopping immigration. Yeah, it's probably bad for the overall economy, but it's good for _my_ economy. And after 30 years of declining wages and rising college costs I'll take what little I (might) get.
on shitty minimum wage jobs. For one thing you haven't completely destroyed your tech industry with cheap work visas (though your right wing is trying). You also have universal healthcare and a much more robust safety net. And a better higher education system. Your entire system is much better suited to deal with these changes than our puritanical, "I got mine f-u" one.
when all the chains that aren't $30/meal are running them and you don't have a choice because you just gotta eat and you're too tired after 12-16 hours of shift work and the gig economy.
The moral of the story is things can always get worse. Especially if you let them, and we do.
I've had family who sorta tried (illness in the family made it impossible for the single parent to work) and you get about $200/mo if you're destitute with a note from a doctor saying you're a full time caregiver for a sick relative. There's no housing assistance to be had either. What little there is has 8 year wait lists.
I don't know if the dole ever existed in America, but I can sure as hell tell you it doesn't now. While I'm on the subject there's no such thing as welfare queens either. UBI would be nice, but I don't see us getting it because of the aforementioned welfare queens. That myth's got legs and no amount of evidence seems to kill it.
the bloody Chinese can't even do it. Also $13/hr isn't much of a raise in 17 years.
everyone else, sure. But not those guys. Well, you could try violence, but every time it's been done it's just ending with a different bunch of yahoos. I guess we could try worker solidarity, but nobody wants to pay for the other guy to have stuff. Lazy good for 'nothin's...
but not a dime for the various cable companies that took billions in state and federal cash and didn't deliver promised network upgrades. Sounds about right. This guy just didn't grease the right palms.
but the only way left wing policies (like fair treatment across race) get traction is through humor. Our media is owned by very rich, very right wing men who have a stake in keeping racism alive and well since it divides the working class.
by inflation. They're not getting adjusted. And then there's things like Food Stamps & housing programs. I don't use them directly, but they pump money into a sector of the economy that spends 100% of their income. Putting more money in Warren Buffetts pocket doesn't help me. He doesn't spend it. I need it in the hands of folks who spend so they can buy what I'm selling. I need a vibrant middle class.
And don't get me started on cuts to education, especially college. Anyone who tells you that college costs too much because dorms are nicer is lying through their teeth or has been listening to somebody who is. We slashed federal subsidies for public universities in the 90s (thanks Clinton) and it's more than quadrupled the out of pocket cost. Of couse the companies don't care because they can just use the H1-B visa program to get the talent they need cheap while complaining about dumb Americans.
I'm inclined to agree.