Support NeoGAF

[ChoklitReign]

And what are the two big "Christian" issues that always end up in the headlines? Gays and abortion. Two things that Jesus said absolutely NOTHING about.

Jesus did say a lot of hardline things about divorce . . . but no one seems to be pushing those laws.

I don't understand how the Old and New Testaments can be considered important for a single religion. Usually their messages are opposed to each other.

 

[Mortrialus]

Fucking ethered.

Going through it right now and the comments are a lot more than "some" of the comments are scathing. The comments are a much better read than the article itself.

Wow. An incredibly simplistic, primitive anti-intellectual rant. I guess this is where the GOP is being driven by the tea party children at the wheel.

This article feels like it was written by my Aunt.

In the mind of Stephen Moore, economists just arbitrarily believe all sorts of silly things that defy "common sense". Why do our nation's top economic minds reject Stephen Moore's "common sense"? Obviously there is a reason, but Moore pretends that there isn't. To Moore, the entire national economy reduces down to a simplistic 3-sentance anecdote about his kids. It literally never occurs to Moore that maybe things are a little more complicated than he realizes, or that maybe he should at least ask _why_ economists believe what they do before dismissing tenured faculty at Harvard, Princeton, Berkeley, MIT, etc.

Good columnists discredit other people's ideas with facts and evidence. Stephen Moore doesn't bother with that. He doesn't even bother to accurately summarize what his opponents believe. He needs to go back to college to brush up on his writing skills. While he's there he can also take some economics.

Boy is this daft. "I'm too dumb to understand basic economics, but what I think is common sense, common sense is right, thus economics is wrong and acutally dumb and I am actually smart".

These are the folks already Gallileo fought against.

Let's hope this reflects the Murdoch-effect taking hold of the WSJ. Otherwise no wonder why this country is going where it is going - the "reading a book is bad for you" faction is now occupying the comment and anlaysis pages of leading newspapers.

Stephen Moore's entire argument boils down to a contrived analogy involving his children, but in the mind of WSJ reader it's "leftist critics" that have no substance. Moore doesn't even understand what academic economists believe. Nor does he care to; he's too satisfied with his own preconceptions, or what he calls "common sense."

I will seriously consider canceling my WSJ subscription if they continue to publish this type of simplistic nonsense.

 

[TacticalFox88]

I don't understand how the Old and New Testaments can be considered important for a single religion. Usually their messages are opposed to each other.

Contradictions, how do they work?

 

[videogamer]

Whats needed is more competition.

From the government.

The free market has gone and done what they do best: fuck things up for the consumer.

Heres what needs to happen:

Government needs to pour billions into government universities. Poach all the best teachers from the private sector. Build the best classrooms. Get the best reputation.

This will take at least 15 years, because of how much value people put into rankings, and how slow they move.

But imagine it's 2025. The US News college rankings come out.

1) UMass Boston
2) SUNY Albany
3) UMass Amherst
4) UC Berkeley
5) U Texas
6) Harvard
7) UCLA
8) U Florida
9) Yale
10) U Michigan


So what does this mean? All the big name PRIVATE schools can no longer rely on their name alone and cannot demand an enormous premium. No longer is having "Princeton" on your resume worth $200,000 because having "SUNY" is more valuable but costs only $40,000

And with students being able to chose between $5,000 a semester at the US number 1 school in the country (UMass)..... vs $40,000 at #6 Harvard down the road...?

Harvard (and everyone else) cant compete. So they have to lower their tuition.


So now, Harvard, NYU, Emory etc all need to match the price of their public counterpart because the education level is the same AND by that point, the brand and reputation is the same.

Result: $5,000 tuition for all.

Or students decide that they should go to cheap schools. Schools will lower their prices if no students come.

 

[empty vessel]

Looks like the Obama administration might have found their election-year patsy ...

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-blankfein-goldman-20110823,0,2783618.story

"Blankfein" and "patsy" should never be used in the same sentence, even only by implication.

 

[KtSlime]

Or students decide that they should go to cheap schools. Schools will lower their prices if no students come.

Or employers only hire employees from the best schools, and people decide to not go to cheap school because they can't get work...

 

[Gaborn]

I suppose you are also against a minimum wage, since this interferes with the state's ability to undercut other states for attracting employment opportunities?

I'm against a federal minimum wage law, yes. I think if a state wants to set their own minimum wage (as some states currently do set one that is above the federal minimum wage) they have a perfect right to do so though.

I see no benefit to the US as a whole for permitting states to 'steal' other states businesses. Could you tell me why this is favorable?

Because it ultimately leads to better outcomes for workers. To use an example that many westerners consider tragic, look at sweat shops in poor countries. The reason they thrive in poor countries is because while the workers start out with very low wages in very poor conditions (and they choose to work there because the pay is better than other options in the area just for the record, adults aren't forced to work in sweat shops generally) often the company ends up moving - because gradually the people where the factory was located improved their lives and their working conditions to such an extent the company could find cheaper labor elsewhere. Yet that doesn't always kill the local economy, it just means that a new business is ripe to move in with a motivated work force who, again, are still going to demand better working conditions.

To bring it back to the US though, if I'm looking for a job and my previous employer payed me $15 an hour in the field I'm trained in and another state is going to offer me $17 an hour for the same job, assuming my other costs (such as property taxes, sales tax, income tax, etc) are favorable I have a very big incentive to move there. And if I was already working but not happy in my previous position when I left for that new company if they want to retain future workers they're either going to have to compete for my services - or choose to cut costs and risk going out of business.

How is that NOT a desirable outcome? Or, more to the point, who is that not a desirable outcome for?

Just how far do you believe the states should have in their "rights"

I believe the Supreme Court has set some decent limits. I don't believe, and Ron Paul said in that video that was linked earlier as well for example that states should have the power to enforce segregation laws such as Jim Crow. Essentially I don't believe any government at any level should have the legal authority to treat citizens unequally because of an innate characteristic. I think marriage equality should be declared a right, I don't think the GOVERNMENT should be allowed to discriminate, etc.

 

[Snaku]

You can scroll to the bottom of this chart and see the various states ages of consent here.

Vatican State 12

The hell....well that does make sense.

 

[jamesinclair]

Or students decide that they should go to cheap schools. Schools will lower their prices if no students come.

Problem is, you can have a 4.0 GPA from the #125th school in the nation and be the best qualified for the job....

But if the resume pile has Alan from Harvard (GPA not listed) then he's getting the job, and you're not.


People put too much into the brand, especially now when HR departments "screen" hundreds of resumes into a top 10 by looking at the most arbitrary of details.

 

[Puddles]

Going through it right now and the comments are a lot more than "some" of the comments are scathing. The comments are a much better read than the article itself.

There's a woman named Nicole Hamilton who makes some of the best comments I've ever seen on any article ever. I think she starts on page 21 (going backwards from page 25, so it doesn't take long to get to her stuff).

 

[empty vessel]

Because it ultimately leads to better outcomes for workers. To use an example that many westerners consider tragic, look at sweat shops in poor countries. The reason they thrive in poor countries is because while the workers start out with very low wages in very poor conditions (and they choose to work there because the pay is better than other options in the area just for the record, adults aren't forced to work in sweat shops generally) often the company ends up moving - because gradually the people where the factory was located improved their lives and their working conditions to such an extent the company could find cheaper labor elsewhere. Yet that doesn't always kill the local economy, it just means that a new business is ripe to move in with a motivated work force who, again, are still going to demand better working conditions.

Those are by and large foreign businesses, whose power is derived from their domestic countries. There is nothing natural about allowing that kind of exploitation for the benefit of foreign investors. It is one thing to argue that development is painful for workers (as it was in, e.g., England and the US). It's quite another to argue that it should be made even more painful by the free movement of capital from developed countries across borders while restricting the movement of labor. I realize that some Libertarians support open borders, but even this is not realistically enough. It is always easier to move capital (just due to the nature of capital--an accumulation of wealth--itself) than to move labor, i.e., to either move an entire family from a culture or to abandon a family for a different culture.

To bring it back to the US though, if I'm looking for a job and my previous employer payed me $15 an hour in the field I'm trained in and another state is going to offer me $17 an hour for the same job, assuming my other costs (such as property taxes, sales tax, income tax, etc) are favorable I have a very big incentive to move there. And if I was already working but not happy in my previous position when I left for that new company if they want to retain future workers they're either going to have to compete for my services - or choose to cut costs and risk going out of business.

How is that NOT a desirable outcome? Or, more to the point, who is that not a desirable outcome for?

People who do not wish to physically move their family (or move away from their family and friends), the burden of which you are severely minimizing. That burden is exactly where capital's leverage comes from. It is quite natural for people to want to stay where the people they already know live. Who are you to say that the ability to make $2 more per hour outweighs that?

This complicates life, it doesn't make it more enjoyable. Libertarians are the ultimate in fucking killing the ability to simply enjoy life.

 

[Mortrialus]

There's a woman named Nicole Hamilton who makes some of the best comments I've ever seen on any article ever. I think she starts on page 21 (going backwards from page 25, so it doesn't take long to get to her stuff).

Yeah I just went over her comments. Great stuff. Moore is getting eviscerated.

 

[Puddles]

To bring it back to the US though, if I'm looking for a job and my previous employer payed me $15 an hour in the field I'm trained in and another state is going to offer me $17 an hour for the same job, assuming my other costs (such as property taxes, sales tax, income tax, etc) are favorable I have a very big incentive to move there. And if I was already working but not happy in my previous position when I left for that new company if they want to retain future workers they're either going to have to compete for my services - or choose to cut costs and risk going out of business.

How is that NOT a desirable outcome? Or, more to the point, who is that not a desirable outcome for?

What if the business in the other state wants to offer you $11 an hour, and the company that paid you $15 an hour has packed up and moved because they can pay $11 an hour in their new location?

Who is that not a desirable outcome for? Answer: 90% of the population.

 

[unomas]

Head of S&P steps down just weeks after they downgraded the US credit rating from AAA.

The McGraw-Hill Cos., the parent of S&P, said late Monday that Deven Sharma will be replaced by Douglas Peterson, now the chief operating officer of Citibank N.A., Citigroup Inc.'s chief banking arm.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Head-of-rating-agency-SampP-apf-140801248.html?x=0

You've got to be kidding me...

 

[jamesinclair]

Head of S&P steps down just weeks after they downgraded the US credit rating from AAA.



http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Head-of-rating-agency-SampP-apf-140801248.html?x=0

You've got to be kidding me...

I swear to god, there are 12 CEO goverment people that trade jobs every few months.

 

[tokkun]

Whats needed is more competition.

From the government.

The free market has gone and done what they do best: fuck things up for the consumer.

Heres what needs to happen:

Government needs to pour billions into government universities. Poach all the best teachers from the private sector. Build the best classrooms. Get the best reputation.

This will take at least 15 years, because of how much value people put into rankings, and how slow they move.

But imagine it's 2025. The US News college rankings come out.

1) UMass Boston
2) SUNY Albany
3) UMass Amherst
4) UC Berkeley
5) U Texas
6) Harvard
7) UCLA
8) U Florida
9) Yale
10) U Michigan


So what does this mean? All the big name PRIVATE schools can no longer rely on their name alone and cannot demand an enormous premium. No longer is having "Princeton" on your resume worth $200,000 because having "SUNY" is more valuable but costs only $40,000

And with students being able to chose between $5,000 a semester at the US number 1 school in the country (UMass)..... vs $40,000 at #6 Harvard down the road...?

Harvard (and everyone else) cant compete. So they have to lower their tuition.


So now, Harvard, NYU, Emory etc all need to match the price of their public counterpart because the education level is the same AND by that point, the brand and reputation is the same.

Result: $5,000 tuition for all.

I don't buy this at all.

Many public universities already have programs that are as good or better than these private schools. The so-called "Public Ivies"

And I don't think that the cause of student loan debt is because lots of poor kids are enrolling at Harvard.

I would suggest that the cause of the increase in debt is actually the explosion in tuition prices at those public universities. The reason is that state funding for universities has had sharp cuts due to the multiple recessions of the previous decade.

 

[Gaborn]

Those are by and large foreign businesses, whose power is derived from their domestic countries. There is nothing natural about allowing that kind of exploitation for the benefit of foreign investors. It is one thing to argue that development is painful for workers (as it was in, e.g., England and the US). It's quite another to argue that it should be made even more painful by the free movement of capital from developed countries across borders while restricting the movement of labor. I realize that some Libertarians support open borders, but even this is not realistically enough. It is always easier to move capital (just due to the nature of capital--an accumulation of wealth--itself) than to move labor, i.e., to either move an entire family from a culture or to abandon a family for a different culture.

I'm extremely supportive of opening the borders. It's one of the big issues I disagree with Ron Paul on. We need to drastically streamline the process of allowing people to enter the US legally and at a MINIMUM have a broad based guest worker program. People already come here yearly to work anyway, let's legitimize it so we at least know who they are.

People who do not wish to physically move their family (or move away from their family and friends), the burden of which you are severely minimizing.

I'm not minimizing it, but sometimes moving where a job is is a part of life. Lots of people WITH steady employment are asked by their job to move to another city or even another ountry and no one is saying it is easy but realistically that's a part of earning a living, you go ultimately where your services are wanted.

That burden is exactly where capital's leverage comes from. It is quite natural for people to want to stay where the people they already know live. Who are you to say that the ability to make $2 more per hour outweighs that?

This complicates life, it doesn't make it more enjoyable. Libertarians are the ultimate in fucking killing the ability to simply enjoy life.

No one. I'm not forcing someone to move, I'm saying it may be rational for a lot of people to do so. The business that most people would abandon might not be abandoned by a certain percentage of workers for a variety of personal reasons in which case as I said you can either cut costs in other ways (downsizing the volume you do for example, or reducing workers hours while you try to find new workers to replace the workers that have left) or they will go out of business.

However we're getting a little off subject. The point I was addressing was specifically about "stealing" other states workers and my answer is simply that it's not stealing, it's market forces moving a large part of the labor force to where the jobs are, just like a precious metal find used to cause entire towns to spring up around them, and then when the metal was exhausted the town would die and another resource would be found and another town would spring up. Most of the time people are willing to go where the jobs are that offer the best opportunity for the worker.

Puddles - and that is why often businesses will have labor strikes. One thing a lot of people don't know is libertarians are not actually anti-union particularly. The real issue is always the tension between the union and the employer but libertarians generally don't object to unions.


However, and i hate to bail on this conversation early but I need to be up early tomorrow. So I'm going to bed.

 

[empty vessel]

No one. I'm not forcing someone to move, I'm saying it may be rational for a lot of people to do so.

Sure, economically rational. But some, probably the overwhelming majority, of people are just trying to enjoy their short lives through their families and local cultures. They aren't trying to maximize every economic aspect of it. Nor should they. Why should we be basing our policies on what is in the narrow rational economic interest of people when for most people this is fairly low on their list of priorities for what they want out of life?

 

[videogamer]

Or employers only hire employees from the best schools, and people decide to not go to cheap school because they can't get work...

Then businesses should hire from cheap schools only.

 

[Puddles]

I'm extremely supportive of opening the borders. It's one of the big issues I disagree with Ron Paul on. We need to drastically streamline the process of allowing people to enter the US legally and at a MINIMUM have a broad based guest worker program. People already come here yearly to work anyway, let's legitimize it so we at least know who they are.

I'd much rather we got our own population to full employment first. What I would do is identify every single field where we have a shortage of workers and invest heavily into retraining and job-placement for those fields. To all those unemployed philosophy, history, literature and arts majors, as well as unemployed former generic office workers, I'd offer a deal like this: you can enroll in an engineering/science/other field that's in demand program, and if you complete the program and can hold a job in that field for x amount of time, we'll forgive half of your student loan debt.

Our country would be much stronger and much better prepared for the future within 2-4 years.

 

[Flying_Phoenix]

This is why the Public Service Loan Forgiveness Act is something I'm extremely thankful for. 6 more years of teaching and my loans are wiped away.

Yes, it's a low-paying career, but it's worth it.

I really hope that School Counselor or Psychologist at public health care is covered by that.

Link

I just want to graduate already. 2 more years left, then most likely grad school. But I'll end up owing so much (~ $44,000) I'm not sure if it would even be worth it.

 

[jamesinclair]

I don't buy this at all.

Many public universities already have programs that are as good or better than these private schools. The so-called "Public Ivies"

And I don't think that the cause of student loan debt is because lots of poor kids are enrolling at Harvard.

I would suggest that the cause of the increase in debt is actually the explosion in tuition prices at those public universities. The reason is that state funding for universities has had sharp cuts due to the multiple recessions of the previous decade.

I agree, part of the problem is that public tuition has jumped up so much.

I wonder if its a coincidence that the insanely rich and powerful private schools can manipulate politics to weaken public institutions (their competition). Nah, thats just silly.


And while there are public ivies (berkeley) those are so few and far in between. For every Berkeley there are 50 Bakersfield States.

Get enough public universities up to the level of the ivies (and again, prestige) and slash the costs and the privates will either go bankrupt or have to price themselves to compete.




Edit: How about an affirmative action system?

You must hire x% of new employees from a public university.

Problem solved.

 

[KtSlime]

I'm against a federal minimum wage law, yes. I think if a state wants to set their own minimum wage (as some states currently do set one that is above the federal minimum wage) they have a perfect right to do so though.

Because it ultimately leads to better outcomes for workers. To use an example that many westerners consider tragic, look at sweat shops in poor countries. The reason they thrive in poor countries is because while the workers start out with very low wages in very poor conditions (and they choose to work there because the pay is better than other options in the area just for the record, adults aren't forced to work in sweat shops generally) often the company ends up moving - because gradually the people where the factory was located improved their lives and their working conditions to such an extent the company could find cheaper labor elsewhere. Yet that doesn't always kill the local economy, it just means that a new business is ripe to move in with a motivated work force who, again, are still going to demand better working conditions.

To bring it back to the US though, if I'm looking for a job and my previous employer payed me $15 an hour in the field I'm trained in and another state is going to offer me $17 an hour for the same job, assuming my other costs (such as property taxes, sales tax, income tax, etc) are favorable I have a very big incentive to move there. And if I was already working but not happy in my previous position when I left for that new company if they want to retain future workers they're either going to have to compete for my services - or choose to cut costs and risk going out of business.

How is that NOT a desirable outcome? Or, more to the point, who is that not a desirable outcome for?

Why should it be the right of the state to set the minimum wage, but not the right of the country? Are you proposing this as a right belonging at the state level for the practical purpose to be able to keep jobs in the US by letting states compete in the race to the bottom with each other rather than have jobs going to other countries because countries are competing with each other? I don't think the US will be able to undercut many of those developing countries because our cost of living is much higher then theirs and likely not going to go down.

That 'doesn't always kill the local economy' seems like one of those libertarian wagers I'm not really willing to take. Do we have statistics on the rate of those that get killed and those that don't?

Many Americans keep screaming to bring manufacturing jobs to come back to the US, they claim that our economy is collapsing because of out-sourcing. Are you claiming that our local economies are thriving because we have allowed companies to move their labor abroad? What about wastelands such as Detroit - sure a lot of that has to do with poor education, but I think the moving of manufacturing has had a considerable impact on it as well.

Disregarding many social factors, such as having friends, family, and established ties with local businesses, I can see what you are saying about businesses competing for your employment and you being a free agent to move up to businesses with better opportunities, however since there is such a large population of skilled unemployed, wouldn't that keep costs down? Wouldn't what you suggest only exist in a market where there are more jobs than people? Heck, I have a college degree from not the worst state school in the US, and can't even get hired at Target for minimum wage (not that I much want to work there anyway), what makes you think I can sell myself for a higher wage when people from slightly better schools with retail experience are vying for the same crappy jobs that I am?

videogamer: And how do we convince businesses to do that?

 

[ronito]

what's this? When did Gaborn become a LINO?

 

[Oblivion]

There's a woman named Nicole Hamilton who makes some of the best comments I've ever seen on any article ever. I think she starts on page 21 (going backwards from page 25, so it doesn't take long to get to her stuff).

Yeah, enjoying those so far. But...

Excellent article, let's hope our Universities recognize (and adjust accordingly) that intellectualism should not be embraced at the expense of common sense.

oh my gawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwd

 

[tokkun]

Get enough public universities up to the level of the ivies (and again, prestige) and slash the costs and the privates will either go bankrupt or have to price themselves to compete.

Maybe if there were a lot. I'm a bit skeptical, because there was recently an article (sorry I don't remember the source) that looked at the top-ranked public schools and found that the student body was still disproportionately wealthy. At Michigan, for example, there were more students whose families made more than 200K per year than there were from the entire bottom 50% of incomes.

Slashing costs would certainly help, but where does the money come from? I'm at one of those public ivies now, and every year there is less and less money. Even when tuition goes up, professors are still being asked to take pay cuts in the form of furlough days and our health care deductibles tripled in the last year.

 

[Oblivion]

what's this? When did Gaborn become a LINO?

I'm assuming some time shortly after he embraced the idea of assassinating the President.

 

[Flying_Phoenix]

Yeah, enjoying those so far. But...



oh my gawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwd

I just noticed that he has a fly on his forehead...

 

[jamesinclair]

I enjoy when poligaf threads get their own spinoff, like the current boner/baby thread.

Its amusing to watch the crazing come out of the woodwork. Theyre too scared to join us here though.

 

[Clevinger]

I enjoy when poligaf threads get their own spinoff, like the current boner/baby thread.

Its amusing to watch the crazing come out of the woodwork. Theyre too scared to join us here though.

It's not fun being piled on. Or being called crazy.

 

[Oblivion]

I just noticed that he has a fly on his forehead...

It's okay. I didn't notice it the first several times I watched either. :lol

 

[ToxicAdam]

I enjoy when poligaf threads get their own spinoff, like the current boner/baby thread.

Its amusing to watch the crazing come out of the woodwork. Theyre too scared to join us here though.

I don't think you are in any position to determine who 'the crazies' are.

 

[Piecake]

Maybe if there were a lot. I'm a bit skeptical, because there was recently an article (sorry I don't remember the source) that looked at the top-ranked public schools and found that the student body was still disproportionately wealthy. At Michigan, for example, there were more students whose families made more than 200K per year than there were from the entire bottom 50% of incomes.

Slashing costs would certainly help, but where does the money come from? I'm at one of those public ivies now, and every year there is less and less money. Even when tuition goes up, professors are still being asked to take pay cuts in the form of furlough days and our health care deductibles tripled in the last year.

Taxes and state funding. We can even frame the new taxes in a way that even GOPers will appreciate. Legalize weed, tax the hell out of it, and then use that money to fund colleges. That way, those pot smoking college hippies will be paying for real hard working americans to go to college on the cheap.

Obviously, I would imagine that we would need more revenue. Well, we could always decriminalize drugs and save us a boatload. Though you can't really justify that nearly as well as the pot tax

 

[Puddles]

It's not fun being piled on. Or being called crazy.

How are you going to realize that your views are idiotic without dozens of people telling you why they're idiotic?

 

[jamesinclair]

It's not fun being piled on. Or being called crazy.

Im just saying every time we get a spinoff thread, a bunch of posters Ive never heard of come out and comment, and then disappear into the nothingness.

Some, but not all, have crazy ideas. They should come join us and we can show them the errors of their ways.

I don't think you are in any position to determine who 'the crazies' are.

:lol

 

[Vicetrailia]

So when a government breaks a social contract, is it only up to the citizen to enforce punishment? What should happen to a government? Libya or bust?

 

[TacticalFox88]

How are you going to realize that your views are idiotic without dozens of people telling you why they're idiotic?

hmm...that's a good ass point. Unless they self educate.

 

[Chichikov]

It's not fun being piled on. Or being called crazy.

It's not that bad.

People need to harden the fuck up.

 

[Agnostic]

I enjoy when poligaf threads get their own spinoff, like the current boner/baby thread.

Its amusing to watch the crazing come out of the woodwork. Theyre too scared to join us here though.

The strange people like to lurk in this thread.

/goes back to lurking

 

[Piecake]

It's not that bad.

People need to harden the fuck up.

To be fair, The Road is a boring book

 

[Chichikov]

To be fair, The Road is a boring book

OMG IT'S HAPPENING AGAIN!

I'm quitting poligaf.

 

[Byakuya769]

I don't think you are in any position to determine who 'the crazies' are.

-beaten-

 

[aronnov reborn]

.

Same here. It's absolutely sickening hearing some of the supposed "christian" people constantly bitching about the poor.

i know.. one side want's to give them fish off my plate by their standards (I already give to charity by my free will).. the other side wants them to learn how to fish... i really do wonder which side is closer.... to the "christian" teaching.

 

[Particle Physicist]

http://dailydish.typepad.com/.a/6a00d83451c45669e2015434bb1f04970c-550wi



Link

Insane. I wonder what caused the dip in 2002. Anyone know?

 

[Flo_Evans]

Sure, economically rational. But some, probably the overwhelming majority, of people are just trying to enjoy their short lives through their families and local cultures. They aren't trying to maximize every economic aspect of it. Nor should they. Why should we be basing our policies on what is in the narrow rational economic interest of people when for most people this is fairly low on their list of priorities for what they want out of life?

You are keying in on the major flaw of libertarian ideals. Normal people make economic sacrifices all the time because other things are more important to them. The libertarians ideals only work if one is selfish, supporting extended family or staying in a community are foreign concepts to them, IMHO there is something wrong inside of them, they see themselves as isolated individuals without ties to humanity.

 

[XMonkey]

To be fair, The Road is a boring book

Boring? I read it cover to cover in one sitting. I think that's the best way to read it actually.

 

[Piecake]

i know.. one side want's to give them fish off my plate by their standards (I already give to charity by my free will).. the other side wants them to learn how to fish... i really do wonder which side is closer.... to the "christian" teaching.

definitely the first one because how does the other side go about wanting them to learn how to fish? Why, not funding any programs that could help them learn how, of course and taxing the poor more as well since the tax code should be 'fair' and no one should get a 'free ride'. Their wanting them to learn how to fish is exactly that, a want/prayer. They don't actually want to spend the time/money to actually teach them how to fish

 

[GaimeGuy]

the republicans don't want to give them fish, and they don't want to teach them how to fish, either. they want them to get their own fish and figure it out themselves.

Liberals want to give them fish and teach them how to fish. Once they can fish on their own, we won't need to give them fish anymore.

I prefer shrimp, personally.

 

[Byakuya769]

i know.. one side want's to give them fish off my plate by their standards (I already give to charity by my free will).. the other side wants them to learn how to fish... i really do wonder which side is closer.... to the "christian" teaching.

"Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar’s, and unto God the things that are God’s”"

"It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”

There was a certain rich man who lived in great luxury and at his gate laid a beggar named Lazarus, whose body was covered with sores. He was hoping that he might receive scraps from the rich man's table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores.

After a while the beggar died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's side. The rich man died, was buried and from his torment in hell raised his eyes to see Lazarus sitting next to Abraham up in heaven. He cried out, "Father Abraham, have mercy on me, and send Lazarus to dip his finger in water to cool my tongue and stop this burning!"

But Abraham said, "Remember, my son, when your life was filled with all good things while Lazarus had a bad life and no one cared. Now Lazarus is being comforted while you are being tormented. Also, there is a deep pit between us so anyone who would pass from here to you cannot, and no one can cross from where you are to us."

The rich man said, "Then I beg you father Abraham, send Lazarus to my five brothers at my father's house to warn them so they will not end up here where I am being tormented!"

Abraham replied, "They have Moses and the prophets, let them listen to them."

But sure, concern yourself with where YOUR, emphasis yours, fish is going and to whom.

And please don't make me go through and find what the prophets had to say, it's even more damming.

 

[KtSlime]

i know.. one side want's to give them fish off my plate by their standards (I already give to charity by my free will).. the other side wants them to learn how to fish... i really do wonder which side is closer.... to the "christian" teaching.

You haven't read it have you?

I'll let you in on a secret. Not a single human, ever, ever, has made it on their own. Not a single mammal has survived without the aid of others of its kind*.

Paying taxes, to support public education aids in the survival of the species. Paying taxes to help the sick aids in the survival of the species. You are not more deserving of the things you have simply because you have them, you like everyone else is mostly a product of environment/circumstance.

The other side isn't suggesting the poor learn how to fish, they are throwing the poor into the ocean and telling them to catch fish without the tools nor the knowledge to swim.

*I suppose this isn't entirely true, I guess there have been cases where humans have aided in the survival of a particular individual mammal, i.e. nursing it/feeding it.