Any smart employer will always know as much as they can about potential employees. It's just good business sense to know everything you can know about your employee.
I'm sure there are businesses set up which will set your information for a price to whichever business wants to buy it. I'm also sure that backround checks are routines and depending on the job, different backround checks.
Do you really think the only way they can get your information is by Googling you? Are you really that naive? They know what you buy, they know how you live, they know your medical records, your credit records, your academic records and any other records which are in any other database. So in general, they know you. If they want you they'll hire you, and if they don't want you then they wont hire you.
Most smart employers will do a backround check on their employees. I know I would if I were the employer. Consider the fact that Google might sell your information to employers, and it's quite clear that employers already know as much as they need to know about you.
I don't know if the fact that you've smoked marijuana once or twice is going to make a difference, because most people in the world have tried it before. I think your lifestyle DOES matter to employers. I think your culture DOES matter to employers. I think if you want to work in certain places you have to adapt to the lifestyle and culture of those places.
So while I may think that judging a person on one issue is not very intelligent, there entire profile of a persons personality type and lifestyle does show if the person will be a good worker, or what kinda worker they'll be. For certain jobs being a marijuana smoker is a plus, if you want to be a musician, an artist, a writer, or just an innovator type. If you want to be an engineer, a manager, or deal with mission critical decisions then you don't need to mess with any drugs of any sort. So a decision maker needs to be clean and an innovator needs to be high, at least some of the time.
In general, we need to discuss what can be done, to improve cancer screaning, and treatment, using open source technology. We need a slashdot or similar site which deals with genetics, technology, medicine, and health research and related topics.
Cancer is a threat to us all, and while we discuss Netscape vs IE, or Linux vs Windows, we ignore the fact that we arent using open source technology or ideas in healthcare. I think we should discuss personalized-medicine, and ways to lower the cost of cancer screenings and treatments.
We need to launch an open source movement or foundation in his memory to find an open source cure for cancer. I think all of us have lost close friends and family to cancer and this is a problem we should unite to solve.
No, we are not a socialist society. We are a capitalist society. If America was about socialism, we wouldnt have a third world in poverty because we'd be donating all our wealth to help them. We are a capitalist society, accept it and move on. We have the worlds richest people, richest companies, and strongest economy, and this is not because we redistribute the wealth, its because we protect wealth. When you protect wealth, it keeps the economy strong.
You think there were social programs in the ancient world? No.
If you want to go to college, the community or the church will pool its money to start a college fund for you to go. If you want to build a road, pay the toll or let the local governments handle it. The federal government should not handle these projects.
The poor are not going to rise up. Africa is poor, and they arent going to rise up, because Africans want to be rich too. China is not going to rise up, because they want to be rich. Don't you want to be rich?
The Republicans reward the wealthy because that makes sense logically. It makes sense to reward success and punish failure. This is basically how it works in the office, if you do a bad job you usually get less pay, or a lower title, or transfered to some lower job. Under the Democrat's, they'd fire the person and give them a reward for being fired.
On the surface, it seems the Republican way of dealing with people is cold, but in reality this is simply what works in practice. If you are training a dog to do tricks, and the dog succeeds at doing these tricks, and you give the dog a treat, the dog learns to do tricks for treats. The Democrat would give the dog the treat either way, and this makes training the dog less time efficient.
As far as race, race is a cultural issue mainly. The racial issues which are the issue today won't be the issue in 20 years. The genetic technology we are discovering now may allow for people who have enough money to select the race of their baby, so eventually we will all be the same race anyway. The difference will be the difference in income. Let me make this clear, we have never lived in a world of equality, we have always lived in a world of inequality. The goal of capitalism itself is to create fiscal inequality. The goal of capitalism is diversity of wealth, diversity of income. After the problems of race are solved, by technology, all that will be left are income issues.
Democrats are in the wrong century because they ignore the fact that 100 years from now these debates on race won't exist. We all will be the same race either through technology making everyone the same race or through breeding, either way the racial issue is very temporary on the century scale. The income inequality is an ancient problem, if you want to consider it a problem, and it is neccessary. You look at Rome, in Rome we had the barbarian masses of poor, and the rich in Rome. You look in Egypt, you had the workers building the Pyramids and you had the rulers. Look at Europe, you had the kings, the princes, the nobility, then you had the slaves. Society has ALWAYS been set up like this. It always WILL be like this, so instead of trying to change what is unchangeable, focus on solving problems which people actually want solved.
You want to work on the environment? Go ahead. You want to work on educating the poor? go ahead. And if you want people to have the oppurtunity to get rich, go ahead and create that, but you arent going to get far if you want to change the entire social order of society when it has been this way for thousands and thousands of years. It was this way in Africa before racial slavery and the concept of races was invented. Egypt had classes. Rome had classes. Europe had classes, and America has classes. Race as it exists now will not be the same thing 100 years from now.
The Democrats fail to understand that we need a diversity of wealth. We need income diversity. Capitalism provides income diversity, and the greater the income diversity, the stronger the economy is in the long term. Sure in the short term socialism sounds good because in the short term it might make sense, but in the long term, if we are going to organize society, we need income diversity. Capitalism and society only works because of income diversity, not in spite of it. If everyone had the exact same income, then our entire society would be completely different, we'd have less carrots to offer people.
There are some aspects of Marxism which make sense, full employement if it were possible makes sense, but communism just will not work in reality.
What is their plan? Do they plan to revamp national intelligence? do they plan better surviellance? Do they plan to invest our tax dollars in security? If the Democrats were to for example, run on increasing the defense budget, or doubling the defense budget, or increasing the budget for national security in exchange for higher taxes then maybe they'd win. But if the Democrats run on raising taxes and giving the money to social programs and universal healthcare, they will DEFINATELY lose. The Democrats have no chance in hell of winning with a weak platform. You know this, I know this.
These faith based initiatives are better than charity. NASA is a waste of money in its current form, and while I do think we need NASA for space research, we need to classify this research and privatize it. The space industry should be either classified or privitized for national security reasons.
What proven trusted NGO are you talking about? How can any NGO be more trusted than the church? Why do you believe church and state should be seperate? Maybe that was the problem, maybe we do need to combine church and state. Why do we need huge burocracies? and who are these professionals you speak of? On the issue of the enironment, pollution does not benefit anyone, but once again you have to prove that it is profitable to clean it up, you have to offer a plan.
The only point you made in your rant was on pollution, yes pollution is bad, and yes the conservative thing to do would be to protect the environment, but it has to be profitable to protect the environment. You cannot convince people to do something just be saying it needs to be done, you have to build the industry first, and prove that it's profitable. If cleaning up the environment were as profitable as messing it up, then you'd be getting somewhere. If these alternative energy companies were as profitable as oil and coal, then perhaps oil and coal companies would buy these companies up. You have to discuss apply economics to every arguement and policy decision you make, because every decision is based on the economics. If it's profitable enough its good, if its expensive then its bad. Destroying the environment is very expensive in the long term, but in the short term its very profitable.
I don't think impeaching the President is good for the country. Who exactly are we going to replace him with, and why exactly do we want to look this way to the international community? There are a lot of reasons why impeachment is not a good idea.
The Democrats have no party platform and worst of all, the Democrats arent strong enough. It's not that the Democrats don't know how to govern, the problem with the Democrats is that they don't know how to do foreign policy and international security. Democrats need to focus on security and the global war on terrorism. The main problem with the Democrats is that they don't have plans on how to make America more secure and how to deal with global terrorism. The Democrats had the chance to step up and announce that we need more and better surveillance but they blew it. They had the chance to step up and explain how we have to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons at all costs and they blew it. They had the chance to discuss how we will protect the ports, and secure the homeland, and they blew it. Democrats are getting chances and are basically using these chances to bash Bush, and people don't want to hear constant Bush bashing as if these are ideas. If their best idea is impeaching Bush then I'm sorry but they are actually living up to their reputation as the party of no, and the party of Bush bashers. I'm not going to support a party that only knows how to bash the President.
Democrats need to be discussing security right now, they need to be discussing how we can win the global war on terrorism, and they need to present their strategy or at least a list of things they will accomplish. If Democrats plan to use the law, then they need to discuss what tough new laws they plan to pass or at least let us know that they will do something besides raise taxes. Democrats need to talk about how they will increase our security. A lot of voters will simply vote for whichever party is stronger. Right now Republicans are the strong party.
We cannot pretend the middle east doesnt exist. That statement is just ignorant. We had to take Iraq to have leverage against Iran. I admit the war did not make sense to me at first, but in the long term, it does make sense. In order to strategically be in a position to deal with Iran we had to take Iraq. It's just basic geography that Iran and Iraq are near each other. Iran has stated that Isreal does not have a right to exist. We MUST defend Isreal, because of the economics of the matter. Isreal is very important to the world economy and economic system, far more important than Iran, and if we have to make decisions purely based on economics, it makes perfect sense to choose Isreal over Iran at this time. Isreal is a trusted ally of the United States. Iran is a new kid on the block. Why should we trust Iran?
I do not think we can allow Iran to have nuclear weapons. Iran's current President said Isreal does not have the right to exist, with language this strong how can we allow that particular President to gain access to nuclear weapons? In this situation we simply have to support Isreal.
If you have a better plan to deal with Iran, let me know, but I don't think the option exists to simply forget about the middle east. I think we have to deal with the middle east now that we are there.
The faith based initiative has been set up to allow for this. I honestly do not have enough information on how it works to go into details. You can do the research and see.
I guess you are a liberal, because you assume all conservatives are "greedy". It's not about selfishness, in fact it is selfish to be liberal. Liberals are the party of handouts and special interests. I'm not saying there arent conservatives who are greedy, but conservatives are trying to reduce the size of government and cut out the social programs. Conservatives are giving tax cuts while the greedy big government liberals are raising taxes? Please tell me how being conservative is equal to being greedy. Please explain how cutting taxes, reducing government spending, and promoting an efficient family oriented society is greedy. I'd think that if society did this that it would make people less greedy because people would be able to choose exactly who they want to support.
I don't think it's conservative and progressive, I think its conservative and liberal. The conservatives in this country are more progressive than the liberals. Liberals still are thinking back to the days of FDR, and the 1960s civil rights movement. Liberals arent even thinking about the future. Conservatives on the other hand seem to be thinking 50-100 years into the future. So I don't think the labels matter, it's simple, theres 2 parties, the party of no, and the party of ideas.
You can call it the red or blue party, but ultimately the red party has all the ideas and the blue party simple says no. The ideologies you break the country up into are just mood politics, and moods can change. A socialist can become a communist and then a capitalist. A capitalist can become a socialist and then a communist. So these labels arent the same.
In my opinion, most of the people who are anarchists are simply young kids who don't know that theres no such thing as anarchy. Even tribes in Africa and Native America had government, chiefs, and laws. There never was or will be true anarchy. The government may change between socialist and capitalism, and right now we are capitalism. Communism is dead.
I think most people who are socialists, should read more about how the economy works. I'm not pretending to be an economists expert, but from what I've read, socialism is an idea from FDRs time and does not apply anymore. The whole concept of a socialist society just will not work anymore and cannot work.
Over time, society will become more and more capitalist. I guess I'm being a realist here, but people need to keep up with the times. Saving social security is a lost cause, and its costing more to save it than to just dismantle it and save money in taxes. These social programs cost money, a lot of money. These social programs also are not good for the economy, if you know how the economy works. Ultimately, within out lifetime all social programs will be gone, and all this talk about socialism and communism will be like talking about ancient history, because these systems are ancient and not efficient enough.
I said I believe in helping INDIVIDUALS. Helping the masses is something COMPLETELY different. If you help individuals, it means you know them personally, you minimize your level of risk. If you help the masses, you are helping everyone good or bad. So through the church you can actually decide whom to help and how much, based on their character. The government does not check a persons character when it just gives out checks.
Jesus and Ghandi are examples of people who helped the masses, and we see what happened to those two. Why do you choose to ignore reality? I'm all for helping people, that is why I support the church. It's the churches job to help people. If you believe in god, and you want to help people, join the church.
America is the world's only superpower. America represents capitalism. The world trade organization, the world bank, and the global financial institutions are all capitalist. We live in a capitalist world, not a socialist world. America is on top BECAUSE it is the most capitalist country in the world. The richest man in the world is from America. The richest companies in the world are from America. The worlds richest individuals are American.
Look at the economy, see how the money flows. There are plenty of statistics. Look at forbes, look at our stock market, look at the IRS, look at the structure of the system itself. Look at the back of you dollar bill, and remember the fact that oil is traded in dollars, not euros.
The economy shows you that we live in a capitalist world. We live in a conservative capitalist world, the economy says so. If you want numbers, look at the economy. If these socialist countries you talk about in europe had the strongest economies then we could talk about socialist, but you and I both know it's not like that.
The teachings of Jesus and Ghandi vs the teachings of reality. In reality, Jesus and Ghandi are dead. There is a difference between helping individuals, and helping the masses. I believe in helping individuals.
I know people who are just like you describe, in their 40s or 50s with a long criminal history. Who's fault is it that they are in their 40s or 50s with a long criminal history and why should people who commit no crimes be forced to support criminals? These criminals need god and the church more than anyone else.
As far as life not being fair, look at the third world, and see how people live there. Many people who never commited a crime in their life are starving to death or dying of AIDs. The world is not fair, has never been fair, will never be fair. Help people on your own as an individual or through the church, but forget about forcing the government to do it. Use the church.
If we have free public college, then we can debate this, but we don't, and if we did the quality of the colleges would go down. We have colleges set up as they are now so that people with a criminal history won't influence people who never commited a crime in their lives. It is the responsibility of individual states and the prison system to figure out how to educate criminals. If you want to debate the prison system or the role of the state, then we can, but federal government definately is not responsible for this. If your church wants to reform criminals, go for it. If your church wants to turn criminals into productive citizens, go for it. If you want to help criminals yourself as a career, go for it. All I'm saying is that its not smart to force people who never commited a crime in their life to support those who are career criminals in their 40s.
When I'm in my 20s trying to pay back college loans do I really want to be supporting guys in their 40s and 50s getting out of prison? If I was responsible and stayed out of trouble, why punish me? Why should I have to pay for the irresponsible troublemakers?
Yes there are socialist countries in Europe, but these countries make money because America makes money. The economy is global, and if there were no capitalist countries in the world they could be no socialist countries in the world.
What is the liberal plan for dealing with Iran? What is the liberal plan for national security? What is the liberal plan for dealing with terrorism?
Liberals seem to want bigger government, thats fine, but whats the plan? Liberals want big government to give out handouts or tax cuts? Liberals want bigger federal government to fight terrorism or to fund social programs?
These social programs arent the governments business. The Democrats are wanting to socialize everything, socialized medicine, socialized education, public this, socialized that. The problem with socialized life is it's often lower quality, and at the same time the government gains more control over your life. Suddenly the government picks and chooses who wins and loses, suddenly the government decides who gets what healthcare and who controls what. Why do we want to increase the power of the federal government? That's not conservative.
Democrats claim to have solutions but they never outline their goals. I'm not asking for the ideas, but just show us what the goals are. They want to bring down the national debt? Ok, first explain why we should bring down the national debt, then explain how. They want to support the UN? Okay, first explain why we should rely on the UN, and how. Democrats need to just create a concrete plan, I don't mean just a list of issues, but an actual plan on how they plan to get from A to B, complete with tactics and strategy. The Republicans have the PNAC, what do Democrats have? What is the Democrats PNAC?
Slashdot Mirror
If the information exists, someone is looking at it.
Any smart employer will always know as much as they can about potential employees. It's just good business sense to know everything you can know about your employee.
I'm sure there are businesses set up which will set your information for a price to whichever business wants to buy it. I'm also sure that backround checks are routines and depending on the job, different backround checks.
Do you really think the only way they can get your information is by Googling you? Are you really that naive?
They know what you buy, they know how you live, they know your medical records, your credit records, your academic records and any other records which are in any other database. So in general, they know you. If they want you they'll hire you, and if they don't want you then they wont hire you.
Most smart employers will do a backround check on their employees. I know I would if I were the employer.
Consider the fact that Google might sell your information to employers, and it's quite clear that employers already know as much as they need to know about you.
I don't know if the fact that you've smoked marijuana once or twice is going to make a difference, because most people in the world have tried it before. I think your lifestyle DOES matter to employers. I think your culture DOES matter to employers. I think if you want to work in certain places you have to adapt to the lifestyle and culture of those places.
So while I may think that judging a person on one issue is not very intelligent, there entire profile of a persons personality type and lifestyle does show if the person will be a good worker, or what kinda worker they'll be. For certain jobs being a marijuana smoker is a plus, if you want to be a musician, an artist, a writer, or just an innovator type. If you want to be an engineer, a manager, or deal with mission critical decisions then you don't need to mess with any drugs of any sort. So a decision maker needs to be clean and an innovator needs to be high, at least some of the time.
In general, we need to discuss what can be done, to improve cancer screaning, and treatment, using open source technology. We need a slashdot or similar site which deals with genetics, technology, medicine, and health research and related topics.
Cancer is a threat to us all, and while we discuss Netscape vs IE, or Linux vs Windows, we ignore the fact that we arent using open source technology or ideas in healthcare. I think we should discuss personalized-medicine, and ways to lower the cost of cancer screenings and treatments.
We need to launch an open source movement or foundation in his memory to find an open source cure for cancer. I think all of us have lost close friends and family to cancer and this is a problem we should unite to solve.
There is no middle. Do you want to be rich or poor? decide now.
No, we are not a socialist society. We are a capitalist society. If America was about socialism, we wouldnt have a third world in poverty because we'd be donating all our wealth to help them. We are a capitalist society, accept it and move on. We have the worlds richest people, richest companies, and strongest economy, and this is not because we redistribute the wealth, its because we protect wealth. When you protect wealth, it keeps the economy strong.
You think there were social programs in the ancient world? No.
If you want to go to college, the community or the church will pool its money to start a college fund for you to go. If you want to build a road, pay the toll or let the local governments handle it. The federal government should not handle these projects.
The poor are not going to rise up. Africa is poor, and they arent going to rise up, because Africans want to be rich too. China is not going to rise up, because they want to be rich. Don't you want to be rich?
The Republicans reward the wealthy because that makes sense logically. It makes sense to reward success and punish failure. This is basically how it works in the office, if you do a bad job you usually get less pay, or a lower title, or transfered to some lower job. Under the Democrat's, they'd fire the person and give them a reward for being fired.
On the surface, it seems the Republican way of dealing with people is cold, but in reality this is simply what works in practice. If you are training a dog to do tricks, and the dog succeeds at doing these tricks, and you give the dog a treat, the dog learns to do tricks for treats. The Democrat would give the dog the treat either way, and this makes training the dog less time efficient.
As far as race, race is a cultural issue mainly. The racial issues which are the issue today won't be the issue in 20 years. The genetic technology we are discovering now may allow for people who have enough money to select the race of their baby, so eventually we will all be the same race anyway. The difference will be the difference in income. Let me make this clear, we have never lived in a world of equality, we have always lived in a world of inequality. The goal of capitalism itself is to create fiscal inequality. The goal of capitalism is diversity of wealth, diversity of income. After the problems of race are solved, by technology, all that will be left are income issues.
Democrats are in the wrong century because they ignore the fact that 100 years from now these debates on race won't exist. We all will be the same race either through technology making everyone the same race or through breeding, either way the racial issue is very temporary on the century scale. The income inequality is an ancient problem, if you want to consider it a problem, and it is neccessary. You look at Rome, in Rome we had the barbarian masses of poor, and the rich in Rome. You look in Egypt, you had the workers building the Pyramids and you had the rulers. Look at Europe, you had the kings, the princes, the nobility, then you had the slaves. Society has ALWAYS been set up like this. It always WILL be like this, so instead of trying to change what is unchangeable, focus on solving problems which people actually want solved.
You want to work on the environment? Go ahead. You want to work on educating the poor? go ahead. And if you want people to have the oppurtunity to get rich, go ahead and create that, but you arent going to get far if you want to change the entire social order of society when it has been this way for thousands and thousands of years. It was this way in Africa before racial slavery and the concept of races was invented. Egypt had classes. Rome had classes. Europe had classes, and America has classes. Race as it exists now will not be the same thing 100 years from now.
The Democrats fail to understand that we need a diversity of wealth. We need income diversity. Capitalism provides income diversity, and the greater the income diversity, the stronger the economy is in the long term. Sure in the short term socialism sounds good because in the short term it might make sense, but in the long term, if we are going to organize society, we need income diversity. Capitalism and society only works because of income diversity, not in spite of it. If everyone had the exact same income, then our entire society would be completely different, we'd have less carrots to offer people.
There are some aspects of Marxism which make sense, full employement if it were possible makes sense, but communism just will not work in reality.
What is their plan? Do they plan to revamp national intelligence? do they plan better surviellance? Do they plan to invest our tax dollars in security? If the Democrats were to for example, run on increasing the defense budget, or doubling the defense budget, or increasing the budget for national security in exchange for higher taxes then maybe they'd win. But if the Democrats run on raising taxes and giving the money to social programs and universal healthcare, they will DEFINATELY lose. The Democrats have no chance in hell of winning with a weak platform. You know this, I know this.
These faith based initiatives are better than charity. NASA is a waste of money in its current form, and while I do think we need NASA for space research, we need to classify this research and privatize it. The space industry should be either classified or privitized for national security reasons.
What proven trusted NGO are you talking about? How can any NGO be more trusted than the church? Why do you believe church and state should be seperate? Maybe that was the problem, maybe we do need to combine church and state. Why do we need huge burocracies? and who are these professionals you speak of? On the issue of the enironment, pollution does not benefit anyone, but once again you have to prove that it is profitable to clean it up, you have to offer a plan.
The only point you made in your rant was on pollution, yes pollution is bad, and yes the conservative thing to do would be to protect the environment, but it has to be profitable to protect the environment. You cannot convince people to do something just be saying it needs to be done, you have to build the industry first, and prove that it's profitable. If cleaning up the environment were as profitable as messing it up, then you'd be getting somewhere. If these alternative energy companies were as profitable as oil and coal, then perhaps oil and coal companies would buy these companies up. You have to discuss apply economics to every arguement and policy decision you make, because every decision is based on the economics. If it's profitable enough its good, if its expensive then its bad. Destroying the environment is very expensive in the long term, but in the short term its very profitable.
I don't think impeaching the President is good for the country. Who exactly are we going to replace him with, and why exactly do we want to look this way to the international community? There are a lot of reasons why impeachment is not a good idea.
The Democrats have no party platform and worst of all, the Democrats arent strong enough. It's not that the Democrats don't know how to govern, the problem with the Democrats is that they don't know how to do foreign policy and international security. Democrats need to focus on security and the global war on terrorism. The main problem with the Democrats is that they don't have plans on how to make America more secure and how to deal with global terrorism. The Democrats had the chance to step up and announce that we need more and better surveillance but they blew it. They had the chance to step up and explain how we have to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons at all costs and they blew it. They had the chance to discuss how we will protect the ports, and secure the homeland, and they blew it. Democrats are getting chances and are basically using these chances to bash Bush, and people don't want to hear constant Bush bashing as if these are ideas. If their best idea is impeaching Bush then I'm sorry but they are actually living up to their reputation as the party of no, and the party of Bush bashers. I'm not going to support a party that only knows how to bash the President.
Democrats need to be discussing security right now, they need to be discussing how we can win the global war on terrorism, and they need to present their strategy or at least a list of things they will accomplish. If Democrats plan to use the law, then they need to discuss what tough new laws they plan to pass or at least let us know that they will do something besides raise taxes. Democrats need to talk about how they will increase our security. A lot of voters will simply vote for whichever party is stronger. Right now Republicans are the strong party.
We cannot pretend the middle east doesnt exist. That statement is just ignorant. We had to take Iraq to have leverage against Iran. I admit the war did not make sense to me at first, but in the long term, it does make sense. In order to strategically be in a position to deal with Iran we had to take Iraq. It's just basic geography that Iran and Iraq are near each other. Iran has stated that Isreal does not have a right to exist. We MUST defend Isreal, because of the economics of the matter. Isreal is very important to the world economy and economic system, far more important than Iran, and if we have to make decisions purely based on economics, it makes perfect sense to choose Isreal over Iran at this time. Isreal is a trusted ally of the United States. Iran is a new kid on the block. Why should we trust Iran?
I do not think we can allow Iran to have nuclear weapons. Iran's current President said Isreal does not have the right to exist, with language this strong how can we allow that particular President to gain access to nuclear weapons? In this situation we simply have to support Isreal.
If you have a better plan to deal with Iran, let me know, but I don't think the option exists to simply forget about the middle east. I think we have to deal with the middle east now that we are there.
The faith based initiative has been set up to allow for this. I honestly do not have enough information on how it works to go into details. You can do the research and see.
Criminals can go to church. They can decriminalize themselves, or stay in prison. The goal should be to avoid ever going to prison in the first place.
I guess you are a liberal, because you assume all conservatives are "greedy". It's not about selfishness, in fact it is selfish to be liberal. Liberals are the party of handouts and special interests. I'm not saying there arent conservatives who are greedy, but conservatives are trying to reduce the size of government and cut out the social programs. Conservatives are giving tax cuts while the greedy big government liberals are raising taxes? Please tell me how being conservative is equal to being greedy. Please explain how cutting taxes, reducing government spending, and promoting an efficient family oriented society is greedy. I'd think that if society did this that it would make people less greedy because people would be able to choose exactly who they want to support.
I don't think it's conservative and progressive, I think its conservative and liberal. The conservatives in this country are more progressive than the liberals. Liberals still are thinking back to the days of FDR, and the 1960s civil rights movement. Liberals arent even thinking about the future. Conservatives on the other hand seem to be thinking 50-100 years into the future. So I don't think the labels matter, it's simple, theres 2 parties, the party of no, and the party of ideas.
You can call it the red or blue party, but ultimately the red party has all the ideas and the blue party simple says no. The ideologies you break the country up into are just mood politics, and moods can change. A socialist can become a communist and then a capitalist. A capitalist can become a socialist and then a communist. So these labels arent the same.
In my opinion, most of the people who are anarchists are simply young kids who don't know that theres no such thing as anarchy. Even tribes in Africa and Native America had government, chiefs, and laws. There never was or will be true anarchy. The government may change between socialist and capitalism, and right now we are capitalism. Communism is dead.
I think most people who are socialists, should read more about how the economy works. I'm not pretending to be an economists expert, but from what I've read, socialism is an idea from FDRs time and does not apply anymore. The whole concept of a socialist society just will not work anymore and cannot work.
Over time, society will become more and more capitalist. I guess I'm being a realist here, but people need to keep up with the times. Saving social security is a lost cause, and its costing more to save it than to just dismantle it and save money in taxes. These social programs cost money, a lot of money. These social programs also are not good for the economy, if you know how the economy works. Ultimately, within out lifetime all social programs will be gone, and all this talk about socialism and communism will be like talking about ancient history, because these systems are ancient and not efficient enough.
I said I believe in helping INDIVIDUALS. Helping the masses is something COMPLETELY different. If you help individuals, it means you know them personally, you minimize your level of risk. If you help the masses, you are helping everyone good or bad. So through the church you can actually decide whom to help and how much, based on their character. The government does not check a persons character when it just gives out checks.
Jesus and Ghandi are examples of people who helped the masses, and we see what happened to those two. Why do you choose to ignore reality? I'm all for helping people, that is why I support the church. It's the churches job to help people. If you believe in god, and you want to help people, join the church.
America is the world's only superpower. America represents capitalism. The world trade organization, the world bank, and the global financial institutions are all capitalist. We live in a capitalist world, not a socialist world. America is on top BECAUSE it is the most capitalist country in the world. The richest man in the world is from America. The richest companies in the world are from America. The worlds richest individuals are American.
Look at the economy, see how the money flows. There are plenty of statistics. Look at forbes, look at our stock market, look at the IRS, look at the structure of the system itself. Look at the back of you dollar bill, and remember the fact that oil is traded in dollars, not euros.
The economy shows you that we live in a capitalist world. We live in a conservative capitalist world, the economy says so. If you want numbers, look at the economy. If these socialist countries you talk about in europe had the strongest economies then we could talk about socialist, but you and I both know it's not like that.
The teachings of Jesus and Ghandi vs the teachings of reality. In reality, Jesus and Ghandi are dead. There is a difference between helping individuals, and helping the masses. I believe in helping individuals.
I know people who are just like you describe, in their 40s or 50s with a long criminal history. Who's fault is it that they are in their 40s or 50s with a long criminal history and why should people who commit no crimes be forced to support criminals? These criminals need god and the church more than anyone else.
As far as life not being fair, look at the third world, and see how people live there. Many people who never commited a crime in their life are starving to death or dying of AIDs. The world is not fair, has never been fair, will never be fair. Help people on your own as an individual or through the church, but forget about forcing the government to do it. Use the church.
If we have free public college, then we can debate this, but we don't, and if we did the quality of the colleges would go down. We have colleges set up as they are now so that people with a criminal history won't influence people who never commited a crime in their lives. It is the responsibility of individual states and the prison system to figure out how to educate criminals. If you want to debate the prison system or the role of the state, then we can, but federal government definately is not responsible for this. If your church wants to reform criminals, go for it. If your church wants to turn criminals into productive citizens, go for it. If you want to help criminals yourself as a career, go for it. All I'm saying is that its not smart to force people who never commited a crime in their life to support those who are career criminals in their 40s.
When I'm in my 20s trying to pay back college loans do I really want to be supporting guys in their 40s and 50s getting out of prison? If I was responsible and stayed out of trouble, why punish me? Why should I have to pay for the irresponsible troublemakers?
Yes there are socialist countries in Europe, but these countries make money because America makes money. The economy is global, and if there were no capitalist countries in the world they could be no socialist countries in the world.
What is the liberal plan for dealing with Iran? What is the liberal plan for national security? What is the liberal plan for dealing with terrorism?
Liberals seem to want bigger government, thats fine, but whats the plan? Liberals want big government to give out handouts or tax cuts? Liberals want bigger federal government to fight terrorism or to fund social programs?
These social programs arent the governments business. The Democrats are wanting to socialize everything, socialized medicine, socialized education, public this, socialized that. The problem with socialized life is it's often lower quality, and at the same time the government gains more control over your life. Suddenly the government picks and chooses who wins and loses, suddenly the government decides who gets what healthcare and who controls what. Why do we want to increase the power of the federal government? That's not conservative.
Democrats claim to have solutions but they never outline their goals. I'm not asking for the ideas, but just show us what the goals are. They want to bring down the national debt? Ok, first explain why we should bring down the national debt, then explain how. They want to support the UN? Okay, first explain why we should rely on the UN, and how. Democrats need to just create a concrete plan, I don't mean just a list of issues, but an actual plan on how they plan to get from A to B, complete with tactics and strategy. The Republicans have the PNAC, what do Democrats have? What is the Democrats PNAC?