G. W. Bush or a bunch of right-wing wackos didn't turn America into a totalitarian state... that has been happening for 50 years, with the cheering support of the left.
Ok, I'll bite. I am about as liberal as they come, but am in no way capable of speaking for all liberals, nor do I consider myself the typical liberal. I will, however, try to lead you through what I consider some gross errors in your post.
It was the left who brought us the welfare state, which gave us a national ID system (they say Social Security numbers aren't part of a national ID system, but it IS a national ID in practice).
And just what is so wrong with welfare? Have you thought of the alternatives? I understand that our welfare system in this country leaves a lot to be desired, but on the whole, it accomplishes it's most important goals. Namely, keeping children who's parents are mentally incompetent, physically handicapped, just plain lazy, or dead from starving to death on the streets, breeding diseases that you yourself could catch, or having to resort to prostitution or theft to survive. Many of those welfare dollars you lament having removed from your check go directly to the housing and feeding orphans. Sure, there are some things that could be done to make the system much better, but they are unlikely without EXPANDING the current system, and that won't be happening while the far right is around, will it?
Now, perhaps I misread your comment, and it is the Social Security Card that you are actually mad about. Well, without it, we have to prepare for massive amounts of fraud sapping public projects. But as far as the standards of a national id are concerned, it is a pretty poor one. You see, the real outrage of a national ID is WHY you have to have one. Nobody cares if they have to have a card, but they start to care if they have to present it to travel, obtain food, that sort of thing. As it stands, all you need a SSN for is to take advantage of government programs. They also help when paying taxes:) I am not sure if there is a way to pay taxes without using your ssn, if anyone reading this knows of one, I would love to hear it.
It was the left who supported massive government spending that could only be sustained through a government agency that tracks ALL your financial transactions, can request an financial record from any instutution you do buisness with without a judges permission, and can assume you are guilty of a crime until you are proven innocent.
Umm, you know, until the right took power in 2000, we were doing pretty well at keeping the spending within our control. Since 2000, we have been spending like it is going out of style. If you look at a graph of deficit in the U.S. budget by president, almost without fail, the deficit goes down in democratic administrations, and up under republican administrations. I used to have a link around here somewhere, but I can't find it.
The rest of that is about the IRS, right? So let me make sure I have this right, Liberals created the IRS? All on their own? Funny I don't see wave after wave of conservative trying to dismantle the IRS. I think I am going to call fud on that one.
It was the left who demanded that citizens be disarmed in violation of their constitutional rights.
Um, nope. Your constitutional rights are thus:
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
You have the right to be part of a well regulated militia. Ideally this would fall under the authority of your local government. It was never stated, nor was it intended that you and your drinking buddies can start your own little band of thugs that can push whatever agenda they are brave enough to pull a trigger over. To encourage you to help protect your local, lawfully elected government, you are also allowed to keep weapons on your self and in your home.
Why would anyone want to work any harder than the minimum necessary, if all they get to keep is what you decide they need? And then, when they figure out that they could just as easily be one of the folks on the receiving end of things instead of the producing end, there goes the incentive to even get up in the morning. And that's the point behind the failure of communism and every other welfare system.
What kind of directionless people do you know anyway? It never ceases to amaze me how/. , with its hourly posts about open source software thinks that the only way people could ever bother themselves to contribute to society is by having a dollar waved in front of their faces.
In the real world, yeah, you will have people who do nothing, but that would be a failure on two fronts; Firstly on part of the state to introduce the individual to an enjoyable way to contribute and secondly a failure to use the contribution for the benefit of the society.
Really people, you must have a really poor opinion of humanity. And just what is so disturbing about the suggestion that we have a responsibility to assure that no one has to live in an alley somewhere? The only thing I am sure of is that capitalism has pretty much failed consistently for a few thousand years to solve all of humanities problems. Is it such insanity to suggest that we try something different for a hundred or so?
Now, with that out of the way, corporations have only a few useful functions in our society. They can provide jobs and advance technology. The other thing they do is take a lot of money out of the hands of a large amount of people and put it into the hands of a small amount of people (shareholders). When some get super rich (read Bill Gates) then pretty much our only hope of that money returning to the society is via an estate tax, as no sane human could spend all of that money. Without a forcible mechanism for that money to come back, you end up in a feudal system where the ultra rich own the non rich. Consider this... Last time I checked, Bill had more wealth than like the lowest 80 million Americans combined. Now, that means that if those 80 mil people decided they wanted to double their assets, in theory all they would have to do is team up and go loot Bill's fortune. That is the failing of unchecked capitalism right there.
Well, with that reasoning, why don't we get over this delusion that school is about educating our children and just admit that we put children in school for a cheap form of day care. We talk about rehabilitation because it is the ideal, and the second we stop talking about it is the second we give up on a large segment of our population. Additionally, if all we are doing is removing them from our society, wouldn't it be easier to just kill anyone who comitted any form of crime? Especially if we are sure that they can't be rehabilitated and are going to do it again no matter what.
As far as I am aware, punishment as a deterent has failed to put an end to crime for at least 2000 years now. Perhaps it is time we started to look into something different.
Slashdot Mirror
G. W. Bush or a bunch of right-wing wackos didn't turn America into a totalitarian state... that has been happening for 50 years, with the cheering support of the left.
:) I am not sure if there is a way to pay taxes without using your ssn, if anyone reading this knows of one, I would love to hear it.
Ok, I'll bite. I am about as liberal as they come, but am in no way capable of speaking for all liberals, nor do I consider myself the typical liberal. I will, however, try to lead you through what I consider some gross errors in your post.
It was the left who brought us the welfare state, which gave us a national ID system (they say Social Security numbers aren't part of a national ID system, but it IS a national ID in practice).
And just what is so wrong with welfare? Have you thought of the alternatives? I understand that our welfare system in this country leaves a lot to be desired, but on the whole, it accomplishes it's most important goals. Namely, keeping children who's parents are mentally incompetent, physically handicapped, just plain lazy, or dead from starving to death on the streets, breeding diseases that you yourself could catch, or having to resort to prostitution or theft to survive. Many of those welfare dollars you lament having removed from your check go directly to the housing and feeding orphans. Sure, there are some things that could be done to make the system much better, but they are unlikely without EXPANDING the current system, and that won't be happening while the far right is around, will it?
Now, perhaps I misread your comment, and it is the Social Security Card that you are actually mad about. Well, without it, we have to prepare for massive amounts of fraud sapping public projects. But as far as the standards of a national id are concerned, it is a pretty poor one. You see, the real outrage of a national ID is WHY you have to have one. Nobody cares if they have to have a card, but they start to care if they have to present it to travel, obtain food, that sort of thing. As it stands, all you need a SSN for is to take advantage of government programs. They also help when paying taxes
It was the left who supported massive government spending that could only be sustained through a government agency that tracks ALL your financial transactions, can request an financial record from any instutution you do buisness with without a judges permission, and can assume you are guilty of a crime until you are proven innocent.
Umm, you know, until the right took power in 2000, we were doing pretty well at keeping the spending within our control. Since 2000, we have been spending like it is going out of style. If you look at a graph of deficit in the U.S. budget by president, almost without fail, the deficit goes down in democratic administrations, and up under republican administrations. I used to have a link around here somewhere, but I can't find it.
The rest of that is about the IRS, right? So let me make sure I have this right, Liberals created the IRS? All on their own? Funny I don't see wave after wave of conservative trying to dismantle the IRS. I think I am going to call fud on that one.
It was the left who demanded that citizens be disarmed in violation of their constitutional rights.
Um, nope. Your constitutional rights are thus:
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
You have the right to be part of a well regulated militia. Ideally this would fall under the authority of your local government. It was never stated, nor was it intended that you and your drinking buddies can start your own little band of thugs that can push whatever agenda they are brave enough to pull a trigger over. To encourage you to help protect your local, lawfully elected government, you are also allowed to keep weapons on your self and in your home.
Why would anyone want to work any harder than the minimum necessary, if all they get to keep is what you decide they need? And then, when they figure out that they could just as easily be one of the folks on the receiving end of things instead of the producing end, there goes the incentive to even get up in the morning. And that's the point behind the failure of communism and every other welfare system.
/. , with its hourly posts about open source software thinks that the only way people could ever bother themselves to contribute to society is by having a dollar waved in front of their faces.
What kind of directionless people do you know anyway? It never ceases to amaze me how
In the real world, yeah, you will have people who do nothing, but that would be a failure on two fronts; Firstly on part of the state to introduce the individual to an enjoyable way to contribute and secondly a failure to use the contribution for the benefit of the society.
Really people, you must have a really poor opinion of humanity. And just what is so disturbing about the suggestion that we have a responsibility to assure that no one has to live in an alley somewhere? The only thing I am sure of is that capitalism has pretty much failed consistently for a few thousand years to solve all of humanities problems. Is it such insanity to suggest that we try something different for a hundred or so?
Now, with that out of the way, corporations have only a few useful functions in our society. They can provide jobs and advance technology. The other thing they do is take a lot of money out of the hands of a large amount of people and put it into the hands of a small amount of people (shareholders). When some get super rich (read Bill Gates) then pretty much our only hope of that money returning to the society is via an estate tax, as no sane human could spend all of that money. Without a forcible mechanism for that money to come back, you end up in a feudal system where the ultra rich own the non rich. Consider this... Last time I checked, Bill had more wealth than like the lowest 80 million Americans combined. Now, that means that if those 80 mil people decided they wanted to double their assets, in theory all they would have to do is team up and go loot Bill's fortune. That is the failing of unchecked capitalism right there.
Flame on!
Well, with that reasoning, why don't we get over this delusion that school is about educating our children and just admit that we put children in school for a cheap form of day care. We talk about rehabilitation because it is the ideal, and the second we stop talking about it is the second we give up on a large segment of our population. Additionally, if all we are doing is removing them from our society, wouldn't it be easier to just kill anyone who comitted any form of crime? Especially if we are sure that they can't be rehabilitated and are going to do it again no matter what.
As far as I am aware, punishment as a deterent has failed to put an end to crime for at least 2000 years now. Perhaps it is time we started to look into something different.