Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 11:04 AM:
I learned a long time ago if I saw a competitor do something that became a disaster not to do it myself. The future health care mandates are going to be a disaster and they know it. Duh?
The fact to keep in mind is that in our lifetime NO administration has ever spent less money than the one before them. We are just arguing over how the money will be spent. The dept of defense, war, veterans affairs and nuclear weapons programs are 59% of the reccommended discretionary budget for 2011. Health and human services are 6%! The only decision we really have too make is; do we want the corporations and the very wealthy to continue to write and benefit from our laws, or do we want to join all the other industrialized nations in the world and allow the people to benefit? I realize that all the corporate controlled media (Fox news, Limbaugh, Hannity, etc.) do everything possible to keep the pubolic misinformed about this, but every citizen has the duty to research these facts for themselves.
-- Posted by riverdog on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 12:35 PM
The facts are below. Bt the FY11 Budget is"
Health 23%
Pensions 21%
Other 20%
Welfare 12%
Defense 24%
I see in that number that 56% of the total budget going to health and human services of one type or another.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 1:04 PM
No idea! But it is a lot.
I think I have it. Vote buying maybe?
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 1:27 PM
"...could lead to backdoor privatization of the much-criticized but widely popular National Health Service."
and
"Despite the constant tinkering, no major political party proposes privatizing the health service, and even free-market politicians like Cameron go out of their way to praise it."
Check the "widely popular" and no proposals to privatize comments in the link.
Appears like the Brits are taking a strong stand against any suggestion of a "Boehnercare" type health care plan for their country. Sounds like they want fix it, not repeal it.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 3:15 PM
Wonder if the Brits Health Care Plan is between 2000 and 3000 pages like Obamacare is.?
Repeal it and start over!
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 3:50 PM
"Boehnercare" plan? Have a link?
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 4:07 PM
Boehnercare - The top GOP Priority for 2011
What will Boehnercare do for you?
Seniors in Medicare will have to refund $250 for Part D "donut hole."
Individuals with pre-existing conditions will have their insurance cancelled.
Young adults will be prohibited from being covered by parents after they turn 21.
State low-cost, high risk insurance programs will be eliminated.
Insurance companies will be able to set arbitrary lifetime limits on payments for care.
Insurance companies will be able to cancel coverage if you get sick.
Discounts on brand name drugs will be eliminated.
Insurance companies will charge extra for preventative and wellness care.
Insurance companies will set limits on annual payments for coverage.
Small business will be denied access to state-based exchanges.
Middle income families will be denied tax credits for private insurance.
The long range deficit will increase.
And more benefits for everyone except the people.
One minor correction. It is wrong to refer to the bill by its derogatory moniker of "Boehnercare" but rather by its proper title of "The Health Insurance Industry Entitlement, Benefits and Enrichment Act of 2011."
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 4:35 PM
Sorry, that was the original title, the new title is "The Job-Killing Health Insurance Industry Entitlement, Benefits and Enrichment Act of 2011."
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 4:43 PM
Dead on, commomsense.
The goofy conservative site provided by wheels is good for propaganda but not much on facts. It's common knowledge where Christopher Chantrell (the author of the site) stands.
How much of the Federal budget goes for the wars we fought "off the books"? How much for the 127 U. S. military bases in the world? What percent of the "pensions" are military pensions? How much for the private military contractors?
Corporate America is very much against healthcare reform since it dictates fairplay instead of the bloated oligarcy they expound. These are the same folks that want to get ahold of our Social Security money by "privatizing" the program. If you doubt that "cancer pays" take a good look at the new hospital facility on the interstate near our high school.
The idea that inequality is the enemy of democracy comes from Aristotle.
-- Posted by riverdog on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 4:53 PM
Common,
If that is all you can find that eleminating the bloated 2000+ page Obamacare bill will have an effect on, then Congress should be able to set down and correct all of the above in about 10 pages that could then be understood by even the congressmen/women who would then vote on it.
No more of that silly crap... we have to pass it before we know what is in it! I think you remember who authored that silly statement.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 5:30 PM
riverdog,
This statement is totally misleading and you know it "The dept of defense, war, veterans affairs and nuclear weapons programs are 59% of the reccommended discretionary budget for 2011. Health and human services are 6%!" Even if it is true, and I see no backup other than your post to support it, the key word is "DISCRETIONARY", which is only a part of the total budget. You are trying to make us believe that only 6% of the budget is spent on health and other people programs, while in reality over 50% of the total budget is spent here.
You are not at a democrat committee meeting here where we will buy into all of that phoney baloney.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 5:39 PM
These are the same folks that want to get ahold of our Social Security money by "privatizing" the program.
-- Posted by riverdog on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 4:53 PM
Kind of like when the Democrats seized the money years ago and said the had a balanced budget. I'm coming of age so you young guys need to get use to paying the bill. Ive almost paid out.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 6:31 PM
I could happily deal with the slightly different flaws of an NHS type system if my healthcare costs were halved.
-- Posted by Nil on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 6:09 PM
If you are a supporting taxpayer you will pay more in time. It cant support itself and will be higher than now.
Bad things:
"There isn't a single government agency or division that runs efficiently; do we really want an organization that developed the U.S. Tax Code handling something as complex as health care?
"Free" health care isn't really free since we must pay for it with taxes; expenses for health care would have to be paid for with higher taxes or spending cuts in other areas such as defense, education, etc.
Profit motives, competition, and individual ingenuity have always led to greater cost control and effectiveness.
Government-controlled health care would lead to a decrease in patient flexibility.
The health-care industry likely will become infused with the same kind of corruption, back-room dealing, and special-interest-dominated sleeze that is already prevalent in other areas of government.
Patients aren't likely to curb their drug costs and doctor visits if health care is free; thus, total costs will be several times what they are now.
Just because Americans are uninsured doesn't mean they can't receive health care; nonprofits and government-run hospitals provide services to those who don't have insurance, and it is illegal to refuse emergency medical service because of a lack of insurance.
Government-mandated procedures will likely reduce doctor flexibility and lead to poor patient care.
Healthy people who take care of themselves will have to pay for the burden of those who smoke, are obese, etc.
In an effort to cut costs, price & salary controls on drugs, medical equipment, and medical services are likely to be put in place, meaning there is less incentive to pursue medical-related research, development, and investment, nor pursue medical careers in general.
A long, painful transition will have to take place involving lost insurance industry jobs, business closures, and new patient record creation.
Loss of private practice options and possible reduced pay may dissuade many would-be doctors from pursuing the profession.
Malpractice lawsuit costs, which are already sky-high, could further explode since universal care may expose the government to legal liability, and the possibility to sue someone with deep pockets usually invites more lawsuits.
Government is more likely to pass additional restrictions or increase taxes on smoking, fast food, etc., leading to a further loss of personal freedoms.
Patient confidentiality is likely to be compromised since centralized health information will likely be maintained by the government.
Health care equipment, drugs, and services may end up being rationed by the government. In other words, politics, lifestyle of patients, and philosophical differences of those in power, could determine who gets what.
Patients may be subjected to extremely long waits for treatment.
Like social security, any government benefit eventually is taken as a "right" by the public, meaning that it's politically near impossible to remove or curtail it later on when costs get out of control."
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 6:44 PM
It's a sobering-but-true fact that we are the ones responsible for what happens to us -- both good and bad .
-- Posted by DiseasedTurtle on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 7:25 PM
I agree totally... but it will not go down quite so easily with some on here.
Like the speaker at a seminar I attended many years ago, told us, "You pack your own chute".
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 7:44 PM
what a bunch of gobbelity-gook.
-- Posted by workingdude on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 7:55 PM
"If you are a supporting taxpayer you will pay more in time. It cant support itself and will be higher than now."...pure conjecture
"There isn't a single government agency or division that runs efficiently; do we really want an organization that developed the U.S. Tax Code handling something as complex as health care?" pure BS.& Limbaugh logic. Dept of Nat'l Resources, Social Security, Highway dept. etc...Talk about your "talking points". Goverment programs are in trouble for the same reason that everything is in financial trouble now...the piggyness of corporations and the extremely wealthy. Where was this outrage against gov spending when Geo Bush gave a trillion dollars to his wall street buddys? Every other industrialized nation has govt health care and it's a pipedream that they are going broke because of it. They are going broke the same reason we are...the greedyness of corporate swine. Every other industrialized nation is FAR above us in infant mortality as well as the other 15 criteria that the International Health Org monitors...why is that? Keep in mind that no administration in our lifetime has spent less money than the previous...we are just arguing about how it will be spent.
"Patients aren't likely to curb their drug costs and doctor visits if health care is free; thus, total costs will be several times what they are now" sorry, this just does not hold up when you look at public healthcare in other countries.
"Free" health care isn't really free since we must pay for it with taxes; expenses for health care would have to be paid for with higher taxes or spending cuts in other areas such as defense, education, etc."...You pay for it already in the greatly increased healthcare costs because of it!
"Government-controlled health care would lead to a decrease in patient flexibility."...It's always amazing that some people address problems as if there is no solution except to "scrap the whole thing". How about addressing the coruption in these programs? Is this completely beyond the scope of "we the People"?
"Patients aren't likely to curb their drug costs and doctor visits if health care is free; thus, total costs will be several times what they are now."...Again, just doesn't hold up as an argument since healthcare is very much lower in other copuntries and, according to the World Health Org is superior!
"Just because Americans are uninsured doesn't mean they can't receive health care; nonprofits and government-run hospitals provide services to those who don't have insurance, and it is illegal to refuse emergency medical service because of a lack of insurance." Again-you pay for it with increased healthcare costs.
"In an effort to cut costs, price & salary controls on drugs, medical equipment, and medical services are likely to be put in place, meaning there is less incentive to pursue medical-related research, development, and investment, nor pursue medical careers in general." Medical research is profit driven just like everything else in this country. As long as there is a buck to be made it will exist.
"A long, painful transition will have to take place involving lost insurance industry jobs, business closures, and new patient record creation." Actually jobs will be created which will go a long way toward helping our economy.
"Loss of private practice options and possible reduced pay may dissuade many would-be doctors from pursuing the profession." The AMA controls the number of doctors admitted to med school so as to keep profits high. The big mistake they made was insisting that doctors be recognised as "doctors" everywhere in the world...that's why we have so many foreign doctors...or haven't you noticed that?
"Malpractice lawsuit costs, which are already sky-high, could further explode since universal care may expose the government to legal liability, and the possibility to sue someone with deep pockets usually invites more lawsuits" It's the bloated profits in the med profession that "invites lawsuits.
How about personal freedoms including the right to healthcare. The constitution provides for the gov to provide for the "common good" What more common good than the right to life?
"Patient confidentiality is likely to be compromised since centralized health information will likely be maintained by the government" Long overdue since many people die each year because of the lack of centralized accessable records.
"Health care equipment, drugs, and services may end up being rationed by the government. In other words, politics, lifestyle of patients, and philosophical differences of those in power, could determine who gets what." Are you totally unaware of what determines who gets treatment NOW?
"Patients may be subjected to extremely long waits for treatment." How long do you wait at the docs now? This is a Limbaugh talking point since it just doesn't prove true in other countries. I do business with companies in six foreign countries and have had this conversation with all of them. They are mostly very happy with their healthcare. The only thing they don't have, in most cases, is the ability to go to the head of the line based solely on their financial situation! This, however, will still exist in this country.
"Like social security, any government benefit eventually is taken as a "right" by the public, meaning that it's politically near impossible to remove or curtail it later on when costs get out of control." Lets hope so.
This is off the cuff rebuttals to your cut and paste article (are we not suppose to notice the quotation marks fore and aft in your comments?)
also, to deseased; "Without a doubt , there are times when circumstances do heap hardships on us and we need help from outside sources . But so often we create our own troubles , then quickly turn to blame others . It's a sobering-but-true fact that we are the ones responsible for what happens to us -- both good and bad." Did you not pay attention in civics class...the safeguards in our constitution are not there to protect the wealthy, the majority or the popular opinions. It's a sobering but true fact that they are to protect the poor, downtrodden and the unpopular. Six wolves and a sheep don't get to vote on what to have for supper. When slavery was elliminated or women got sufferage it was not the popular opinion of the voters!
-- Posted by riverdog on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 8:49 PM
Riverdog wrote:
"The dept of defense, war, veterans affairs and nuclear weapons programs are 59% of the reccommended discretionary budget for 2011. Health and human services are 6%!"
The discretionary budget, which accounts only for that part of the budget that is 'left over' after entitlements and other 'mandatory' spending are taken out, amounts to only about 38% of the total budget, thus the 59% figure amounts to only about 23% of the budget.
Non-discretionary spending includes such things as Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Interest on the Debt, and other mandatory spending. 'Discretionary spending' generally includes the business that the Constitution actually authorizes the government to do.
Methinks those that exclude this 'mandatory spending' (which isn't really mandatory) from the budget figures in order to inflate the military share are the ones trying to mislead, not Fox News, etc.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 9:18 PM
riverdog,
Off the cuff and made up as you go, just like your budget figures.
Which one of the reconstituted liberals on here are you anyway?
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 9:24 PM
Riverdog wrote:
"How much of the Federal budget goes for the wars we fought "off the books"?"
None. The budget is 'the books', so none of the budgeted spending can, by definition, be 'off the books'.
The budget is not spending. The budget is not law. The budget is the president's proposal for spending priorities. Actual spending is dictated by the spending bills passed by Congress and signed by the President, or passed over his veto.
To date, the 2011 spending bills have not been signed, even though the law requires them to be so by October 1 of the calender year preceeding. The Democrats did not want the bills completed before the election, because they did not want the CBO to release deficit projections based on them, thinking it would harm their chances in the election. Once they lost the election, they decide to pass that duty to the incoming Republicans.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 9:29 PM
"There isn't a single government agency or division that runs efficiently; do we really want an organization that developed the U.S. Tax Code handling something as complex as health care?"
I disagree. As a former member of the US Military, I am very aware of how it was run. The $100 toilet seats are basically outliers in an organization that is effectively and efficiently run. There are numerous private enterprises that demonstrate extremely poor decision making and efficiency. Medicare has a significant lower cost percentages for administration and overhead when compared to private insurance.
The US tax code was developed over decades by continuous input from outside agencies seeking their own private tax breaks. Of course it needs to be drastically overhauled, but the complexity was forced on it by others.
"The health-care industry likely will become infused with the same kind of corruption, back-room dealing, and special-interest-dominated sleeze that is already prevalent in other areas of government."
Do you mean that the government should be honest and forthright like private enterprises on Wall Street.
"Just because Americans are uninsured doesn't mean they can't receive health care; nonprofits and government-run hospitals provide services to those who don't have insurance, and it is illegal to refuse emergency medical service because of a lack of insurance."
Now you are recommending that those who refuse to purchase health have the right to put their hand into my pocket to pay for their free emergency medical service.
Like social security, any government benefit eventually is taken as a "right" by the public, meaning that it's politically near impossible to remove or curtail it later on when costs get out of control."
If I have paid into social security all of my life, why should not I have a right to participate in the program. I have no objection to it being adjusted to return it to self-sufficiency, even if that means reducing what I receive.
All of the other "bad things" you identified also have clear and obvious explanations and/or causes.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 9:35 PM
According to Wikipedia:
The federal budget for 2011 is projected at $3.83 trillion in total spending, which includes $787.6 billion in Social Security Spending, $898 billion For Medicare and Medicaid, $140.9 billion for education, $928.5 billion For defense spending and war appropriations, $464.6 billion in welfare spending, $57.3 billion for homeland security and teh DOJ, $104.2 billion for transportation, $29 billion in general expenses, $151.4 billion in other spending, and $250.7 billion on interest payments.
Total revenue is projected at $2.57 trillion, with total expenditures of $3.83 trillion, leaving a projected deficit of $1.267 trillion. These revenue projections included the elimination of the 2001 and 200e tax cuts for those making over $250,000, which failed, so the revenue projections are not correct.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 9:43 PM
Commonsensematters wrote:
"If I have paid into social security all of my life, why should not I have a right to participate in the program."
Among other reasons, because the Supreme Court has ruled that you have no right to such payments. They are a benefit offered by the government, but the government is not obligated to comply with any promises regarding levels of payment or individual participation. it is not even obligated to maintain the programme, if it decides to terminate it. The monies collected go into the general fund, not into a trust fund.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 9:48 PM
Wheels, I too have suspected reincarnation.
My opinions may seem a bit right leaning and that is because they are. That does not mean my mind is completely closed to other opinions. Many have said in the past that they skipped over Lemmies's posts while I read them all no matter the lenght.
At least Lemmie came up with something different and interesting every once in a while.
Can't say that about a couple of our esteemed posters on here though.
Continual reference to Limbaugh and other conservatives from those who say they never listen proves those references are from some other source telling folks what he said and what to think and they believe every word.
Maybe it is time for Old John to skip over some posts.
I think I'm a big enough boy to listen and decide what is propaganda and bull and decide for myself unlike those who are afraid to admit they listen to only far leaning one way or another news and commentary.
-- Posted by Old John on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 10:43 PM
Old John,
Some of these posters give me a headache.
And I have a big enough one already trying to make a couple of XP Programs work on my new Windows 7 Laptop.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 18, 2011, at 11:05 PM
"Among other reasons, because the Supreme Court has ruled that you have no right to such payments."
Actually, what I said was I had a right to participate in the program. It is an insurance program, where you do not have a "right" to get all of your premiums back. Some people get more than they pay in, some less, there are no "accrued property rights."
These extracts from Wikipedia may be what you were referring to as the absence of a right, but I am really not at all worried about the government defaulting on these obligations. Obviously there will be modifications to both amounts paid and collected, and at what age they might start, but to me, that is an acceptable fact of life.
"A person covered by the Social Security Act has not such a right in old-age benefit payments as would make every defeasance of "accrued" interests violative of the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Pp. 608-611. (a) The noncontractual interest of an employee covered by the Act cannot be soundly analogized to that of the holder of an annuity, whose right to benefits are based on his contractual premium payments. Pp. 608-610. (b) To engraft upon the Social Security System a concept of "accrued property rights" would deprive it of the flexibility and [363 U.S. 603, 604] boldness in adjustment to ever-changing conditions which it demands and which Congress probably had in mind when it expressly reserved the right to alter, amend or repeal any provision of the Act. Pp. 610-611. 3. Section 202 (n) of the Act cannot be condemned as so lacking in rational justification as to offend due process. Pp. 611-612. 4. Termination of appellee's benefits under 202 (n) does not amount to punishing him without a trial, in violation of Art. III, 2, cl. 3, of the Constitution or the Sixth Amendment; nor is 202 (n) a bill of attainder or ex post facto law, since its purpose is not punitive. Pp. 612-621.[65]
"In 2009 the Office of the Chief Actuary of the Social Security Administration calculated an unfunded obligation of $15.1 trillion for the Social Security program. The unfunded obligation is the difference between the present value of the cost of Social Security and the present value of the assets in the Trust Fund and the future scheduled tax income of the program. In the Actuarial Note explaining the calculation, the Office of the Chief Actuary wrote that "The term obligation is used in lieu of the term liability, because liability generally indicates a contractual obligation (as in the case of private pensions and insurance) that cannot be altered by the plan sponsor without the agreement of the plan participants."
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 6:05 AM
Now everybody stop worrying. We have been assured that the world will come to an end on December 21, 2011 (or some date or other very close nearby). So none of these arguments are going to matter anyhow.
but am wondering the exact time of our departure if maybe it'll come minutes before my dental appointment(covered by private insurance, of course).
-- Posted by voyager on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 6:55 AM
Diseased Turtle -- your comments are right on! We have "nanny state" people on here that somehow, someway expect others to pay for their way. You know, it's "in the constitution" -- everything they want is "in the constitution" including forcing us to buy health care from the government.
I have not had health insurance all of my life. Didn't like it so I've always worked hard to get jobs that offered it. But I never cried about it or asked anyone to pay for it. And most people are willing to DONATE money to help a worth cause when they see it if some unfortunate person gets hurt.
-- Posted by not_sorry on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 8:20 AM
How is this any of your business ?
-- Posted by DiseasedTurtle on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 7:05 AM
It isn't.
But that is what far left wingnuts do best.... mind other peoples's business. Oh and I forgot, add to that other peoples's money.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 8:25 AM
They say others have a right to my money. I say they dont.
Doesn't matter. Leaving in the morning before the storm. 72 in Key West at 6:30 AM.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 9:00 AM
Oh God, Regret, sometimes its all too easy to "hate" you! 72 in Key West, ya say?
-- Posted by voyager on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 10:55 AM
Regrets,
Don't be wasting time. Get out of there while you still have a chance. It won't be dark for awhile yet.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 3:35 PM
Wheels,
Now my wife says she wants me to wait until we know it's not a blizzard. :-(
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 3:46 PM
If we really want to save cost in healthcare, then we need to stop footing the bill for illegal immigrants. Look at what it is doing in CA:
Now that is $600+ million for one city. Add up the rest of CA, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, etc. and that would be a huge savings!
They are here in this country ILLEGALLY- so why should our tax dollars pay for their medical care???
-- Posted by Skeptic1 on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 4:32 PM
Because the politicians of both parties need the Latino vote.
-- Posted by FreedomFadingFast on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 4:43 PM
"Now that is $600+ million for one city."
Actually the numbers are for LA County not the city. Also the originator played pretty fast and loose with how he generated the numbers, and who he counted.
Nevertheless, a recommended solution for those illegal/undocumented workers is to document them. I have always maintained that the most straightforward answer is not to grant citzenship, but to document them with the Mexican equivalent of a social security number, record taxpayers expenditures for services, education, etc., and send a bill to the Mexican government for reimbursement from their oil revenues.
A good number of those workers are performing needed services, especially in hospitality and agriculture industries, and tomatoes would cost a lot more if they were expelled.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 5:20 PM
Regrets,
You're going to get yourself snowed in!
Not 72 here in Gulf Shores, but plenty warm to play golf today, and warmer than SE Missouri.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 5:35 PM
It's hard to blame people who hear misinformation constantly for repeating it, but the head-in-the-sand attitude is a bit frustrating.
For example, everyone "knows" that the federal workers in this country are overpaid paper-pushers and the embodiment of an obese, out-of-control goverment and a major cause of our federal debt.
Here are some actual facts:
The average federal worker makes aproximately 24% Less in salary and benefits than a similar job in the private sector.
There are just over two million federal workers. That's exactly the same number as when Reagan was in office and there are now over fifty million more Americans to be served.
Slashing their pay IN HALF would reduce the federal budget by three percent.
The recent wage freeze for federal workers by Pres Obama will save five billion dollars...that is less than what is spent on the Afganistan war EVERY MONTH!
That will not change the minds of anyone who is closed minded , but there are still some citizens who actually consider THE FACTS!
-- Posted by riverdog on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 5:59 PM
riverdog - if only it were true. Your "facts" leave out the fact that 850,000 postal employees have been "recategorized" as non-government. Also, this from a liberal, Obama supporting research group that wants to do more "insourcing" (google it). Here is a quote directly from their report:
"The Federal government is America's largest employer by a great margin. Although there are two million civilian employees in the Federal government, most people are shocked to learn that there are over 10 million contractors working for the Federal government--over five times as many contractors as there are civil servants. This brings the actual size of the Federal workforce to nearly 13 million workers, which is nearly 10 percent of the entire U.S. workforce."
Numbers are not from your boogy-man Rush or Sean or Glen or Sarah. They come from your own people! Now, would you please "actually consider the FACTS!"???
-- Posted by not_sorry on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 6:13 PM
Dug,
I have a prediction. Dog will ignore your corrections and keep right on propogating his own particular brand of facts. He deals in half truths.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 6:29 PM
There aren't many jobs in the private sector similar to those in government, judges and czars so to speak.
-- Posted by Old John on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 6:29 PM
"County Supervisor Michael D. Antonovich released new statistics from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Social Services showing that Illegal Aliens collected more than $37 million in welfare and food stamp allocations in November, up $3 million from September 2007. Illegals collected more than $20 million in welfare assistance in November and more than $16 million in food stamp allocations, for a projected annual cost of $444 million.
That is not the entire picture of the taxpayer burden. When you add in the cost of free Emergency Room services, free Public School education as well as public safety and free housing the annual cost is $3,000,000,000. ($3 Billion) a year and rising!"
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 6:59 PM
Dog
"Federal employees earn higher average salaries than private-sector workers in more than eight out of 10 occupations, a USA TODAY analysis of federal data finds"
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 7:04 PM
Wheels
I am not happy by I have my fingers crossed. If you here someone screaming North of you it is me.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 7:09 PM
Riverdog wrote:
"There are just over two million federal workers. That's exactly the same number as when Reagan was in office and there are now over fifty million more Americans to be served."
You always quote these 'facts' without any backup. According to the U.S. Government's Office of Personnel Management, there are 4.4 million federal employees. This is, as you note, less than there were When President Reagan was in office. However, the primary reductions came about in military workforce reductions. There 2.2 million Uniformed military personnel at the end of President Reagan's term, during which the 'Cold War' was still in force. The 'Cold War' ended during the term of President Bush I, and military reductions followed. At the end of President Bush's term, military workforce was reduced to 1.7 million. Reductions in the civilian workforce followed, from 3.12 million to 3.00 million.
The reductions continued through the Clinton years. When President Clinton left office, Total employment stood at 4.13 million, of which 1.43 million were Uniformed military. Following the events of 9/11/01, employment began to rise again (the Department of Homeland Security was created, Air Traffic Controllers federalized, and we went to war. However, Uniformed military accounted for only about 50,000 of the increase in workers. By 2007, the number of uniformed military workers was about equal to the level before 9/11/01.
When the Republicans, under whom most of the reductions had occured, lost control of the Congress in 2007, federal employment began to rise again. At the end of 2007, total federal employment stood at 4.13 million. At the end of 2009, it had risen to 4.43 million. Curiously, 164,000 of those additional 300,000 came from increases in Uniformed Military. Both Nancy Pelosi and President Obama had been opposed to the war, so this increase strikes me as odd.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 7:57 PM
BTW- yeah to the House for their vote tonight!
-- Posted by Skeptic1 on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 9:25 PM
adidas, I have mixed feelings about that. On one hand I see it as the house responding to the wishes of the majority of the people. On the other I see it as a useless symbolic waste of time knowing the dems in the senate will block any hope of doing what is right.
The house, I think, would have done us a better service by bringing up a resolution with better ideas and vowing to pursue with a bill to replace the law in force.
-- Posted by Old John on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 10:17 PM
Old John- I totally agree with you. I think they did it to save face because they knew it was what the people wanted. But they should have gone that step further and came up with a better plan.
-- Posted by Skeptic1 on Wed, Jan 19, 2011, at 10:21 PM
"On one hand I see it as the house responding to the wishes of the majority of the people."
This has clearly become one of those statements that has been repeated so often, that some believe it is actually true. There has never been an overwhelming majority of Americans that favor complete repeal of the current health care law. There may have been a majority of Republicans that favor repeal, but that does not translate into a "majority of the people."
There has always been a basic 50-50 split on this issue. This is true because the margin of error for polling on contentious questions is invariably higher than normal. Current polls show about one third of the people want it repealed, a third want it left alone, and one third want it fixed. Other polls show that 85% of the people like aspects of the current law.
If the House members want to do the "will of the people" rather than engaging in a "useless symbolic waste of time" they would launch a bi-partisan effort to improve the law, which is coincidentally what the Democrats wanted last year and have offered now.
--------------------------------------
"...senate will block any hope of doing what is right."
Actually the Senate, rather than blocking what is right, is doing what is right.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 6:11 AM
Commonsensematters wrote:
"This has clearly become one of those statements that has been repeated so often, that some believe it is actually true. There has never been an overwhelming majority of Americans that favor complete repeal of the current health care law. There may have been a majority of Republicans that favor repeal, but that does not translate into a "majority of the people."
The Republicans ran on a campaign against the Health Care overhaul. The majority of voters elected them to represent them, thus, the majority of voters who cared enough to vote either favoured the repeal or did not see the repeal as detrimental enough to vote against it. Thus the Republicans, by holding the vote, are doing the will of the people. Repealing or not repealing it is not the issue - they promised a vote and they delivered one.
"...they would launch a bi-partisan effort to improve the law, which is coincidentally what the Democrats wanted last year and have offered now."
After ramming 'Obamacare' down our throats, and refusing to allow an Republican measures to the floor, they've suddenly found bi-partisanship? How very noble of them.
Having fulfilled the promise for a vote, the Republicans now set about bringing their proposals to the floor. If their proposals are good enough, and garner enough support, it may persuade the Senate to follow suit, to repeal 'Obamacare', and enact changes that actually deal with the cost of health care.
The vote is also significant, since the House is responsible for funding the measure. Given that the House has voted against it, they can justify funding cuts to the programme, in an effort to contain runaway spending.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 7:56 AM
I suppose it's not odd that recruitment rises during an economic downturn. But I did find it odd that recruitment would rise so high given that Ms. Pelosi, Mr. Reid, and Mr. Obama were all promising to get us out of the war, opposed the 'surge' strategy, and cited military costs as one of places where potential savings were to be found.
I just find it odd that recruitment numbers seem to have remained relatively constant through the Bush/Republican years: 1,426 million at the end of 2000, 1,427 million at the end of 2007, peaking at 1,478 at the end of 2003 (the beginning of the Iraq phase of the War on Terror), and then began to rise even as the war wound down and the troop withdrawals were begun. As troops are withdrawn, many should be seeing their status returned from 'Active Duty' military to 'Reserve' or 'National Guard' status. The Reservists are still on the federal payroll, but the cost of the National Guard rests on the states.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 8:54 AM
Spaniard wrote:
"Interesting to see how the number of military personnel declined as the Bush II years dragged on. Incompetent management of post war Iraq, which the Bush admin all but admitted explicitly, must have had something to do with that."
I dont' see that they were 'dwindling'. They never dropped below 2001 levels. As the war dragged on, recruitment dropped, and the economy was good, so fewer saw the need to enter the service. Recruitment, or activation of reserves, increased until the end of 2003, then tapered off. The patriotic ferver following the events of 9/11/01 began to subside. That is understandable.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 9:00 AM
If this was such a wonderful bill, why did the Democrats only get 218-219 votes in the House after passing a bill in the Senate by BRIBING Senators from Nebraska, Louisiana, and Florida in a process that was Unconstitutional and paid for with a 2 TRILLION DOLLAR tax increase while taking over an unrelated lending industry and using those purported savings to say that the Healthcare bill would not bloat the deficit?
And, why does it need 15000+ new IRS agents to enact (I mean ENFORCE) it?
-- Posted by bebo on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 9:37 AM
Wonder if Regrets made it out of town ahead of the snow?
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 10:12 AM
"...they would launch a bi-partisan effort to improve the law, which is coincidentally what the Democrats wanted last year and have offered now."
"After ramming 'Obamacare' down our throats, and refusing to allow an Republican measures to the floor, they've suddenly found bi-partisanship? How very noble of them."
If you remember correctly, one of the prerequisite Republican "measures" involved "scrapping everything" and starting over, which was their going in position in bi-partisanship.
Obviously you may not agree, but there is little doubt that the GOP made a conscious decision that they would not cooperate on the President's initiative, and they valued denying the President a success higher than doing what was right for the American people.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 10:50 AM
No! I have to wait till it's over before I can leave. Now I am doing another wifey do that will take till tomorrow to finish. grrrrrrrrr!
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 10:52 AM
Regrets,
It appears to me you are more concerned, that she who can impoverish you, will do you more harm than nature will. ☻ ☻ ☻ ☻
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 11:32 AM
Common, If it is not right for the American people it has to do with denying the President success in doing what's wrong. Would you cooperate with someone leading you in a direction you knew to be wrong?
Liberals scream for bipartisanship anytime they are not agreed with.
Where was the partinship when the democrats ran things and when the President said republicans can sit in the back?
-- Posted by Old John on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 11:38 AM
Old John,
It will be interesting to see how many of the Dems and Repubs cuddle up during the State of the Union speech.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 11:49 AM
Commonsensematters wrote:
"Obviously you may not agree, but there is little doubt that the GOP made a conscious decision that they would not cooperate on the President's initiative, and they valued denying the President a success higher than doing what was right for the American people."
First of all, you assume that this is 'doing what is right for the American people', which is a pretty big assumption on your part. I've stated my reasons for thinking the opposite many times, so I'll not repeat them here. Those that care, already know them.
You seem to forget that Mr. Obama himself said that the Republicans had some good ideas on health care. Yes, one measure may have been scrapping the whole thing and starting over (which I think was a good idea), but there were other measures proposed. I posted a link to them last year. I gather you had no interest in reading then, so I'll not search for it and repost it. You seem content to believe the Democrat Party line that the Republicans were obstructionists, even as the Democrats obstructed their efforts to present their ideas.
"Obviously you may not agree, but there is little doubt that the GOP made a conscious decision that they would not cooperate on the President's initiative..."
No, I agree. The made a decision not to cooperate on the President's initiative because it was a bad idea. They had other ideas, on which the Democrats made a conscious decision not to cooperate.
Bi-partisanship is not throwing your own ideas out and agreeing to the other party's, it is putting both sets of ideas on the table and creating a viable initiative from all of them. The Republicans would not cooperate in allowing themselves to be bulldozed. For that, I applaud them.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 12:01 PM
Harry Reid doesn't want to bring the measure up for a vote.
I am afraid of my stuff being in the drive (burned) when I get home.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 1:00 PM
Wheels, Over 10 inches snow in greater St Louis area, I'm guessing about 2 in Cape area. It is about 26 degrees. Predictions are for an isoslated 4 foot drift in Regret's driveway by nightfall. :)
-- Posted by Old John on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 1:26 PM
"Bi-partisanship is not throwing your own ideas out and agreeing to the other party's, it is putting both sets of ideas on the table and creating a viable initiative from all of them."
That is exactly what President Obama proposed and would have preferred. Picture this scenario: In 2010 Congressional leaders get together on a bi-partisan basis and hammer out an agreeable plan that is relatively simple in format, reins in insurance companies, is good for small business, covers more people, increases numbers of American covered by private insurance, etc.
Congress is happy, the President is happy, and most importantly, the American people are happy, because government has worked together on their behalf. The President's popularity numbers soar and his re-election is ensured.
There is absolutely no reason why President Obama would not favor this., but there are numerous reasons why the GOP would be strongly against this result, and sadly they decided not to cooperate last year.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 2:08 PM
Old John
:(
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 2:26 PM
Commonsensematters,
It all sounds wonderfully Utopian. Now, picture this: The Democrats admit that there is no inherent 'right' to health care, but that the Congress can enact measures under the Commerce Clause which will help to contain the rising cost of health care, making it more affordable to American citizens.
It may not make as many people happy, but at least it's constitutional. If you can get past that most basic stumbling block of principles, then, perhaps, you can have bi-partisanship.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 3:19 PM
That is exactly what President Obama proposed and would have preferred. Picture this scenario: In 2010 Congressional leaders get together on a bi-partisan basis and hammer out an agreeable plan that is relatively simple in format, reins in insurance companies, is good for small business, covers more people, increases numbers of American covered by private insurance, etc.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 2:08 PM
Somebody want to inform Common, someone who thinks he is on top of all problems.... this is 2011 and it is too late to do it in 2010.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 5:06 PM
Wheels, Over 10 inches snow in greater St Louis area, I'm guessing about 2 in Cape area. It is about 26 degrees. Predictions are for an isoslated 4 foot drift in Regret's driveway by nightfall. :)
-- Posted by Old John on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 1:26 PM
Old, John,
Are you getting the idea that Regrets is afraid of his wife?
I am getting a picture in my mind of that day his wife came in the office and found him on the computer wasting time, he jumped up to keep from getting caught and broke his leg or foot or something....
That 4 feet drift will probably send him into fits of despair.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 5:11 PM
Are you getting the idea that Regrets is afraid of his wife?
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 5:11 PM
I admit it. I scared to death of her. I have seen her in action and it ain't pretty.
I made the mistake of dragging my feet before Christmas and not getting everything finished.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Thu, Jan 20, 2011, at 5:37 PM
Now Rick.... who is that going to leave in SEMO to defend Obama??
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 9:20 AM
The multiple screen names some on here use is like when Hupp told Farley "I think I'll whoop your but", Farley said, Yeah, you and who else?
"Me myself and I!" Better bring three lunches cause it'll take all three of ya!
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 9:47 AM
Spank,
I think Theorist is still busy looking for the source that says Canadians have more guns than U.S. citizens and yeah there is still Ike. Caddy goes without saying. Obama could drain his sewage into Caddy's garage and he would smile about it.
But all of them with their short posts pale in Comparison to Common and his long disjointed essays.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:15 AM
Missouri should take over the economic policy of the whole nation. We have such great ideas like paying farmers to keep the rice land flooded so birds displaced by the oil spill in the gulf have a place to lite and now offering small farmers grant money for home energy audits and updates to make there hog operations more efficient. And all this with a democrat governor that is threatening to drive liberals crazy by cutting funding for mental care. [catch 22 maybe?]
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:26 AM
I think Ike/Spaniard's account has been hacked. His recent posts have lacked their usual fervor...
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:29 AM
What about the bean and corn fields where they were paid to plow up a small levee and flood them as well.
I think they should arrest the damned ducks, from what I saw in late December they were not using some of those temporary lakes.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:36 AM
BC, The later is a story of this paper today.
Also today I hear some federal blow-hards thinking out loud about states being allowed to declare bankruptcy to save their budgets.
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 12:12 PM
Well you all get another 5 million government money and that's okay because it's you and you deserve it, right? All you farmers that were complaining earlier about paying 1.25 an acre almost 2 centuries ago that is. There are so few of you so it's okay you get aid right? Because you always have. And it's okay. Right...
-- Posted by happypappies on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 12:26 PM
Well you all get another 5 million government money and that's okay because it's you and you deserve it, right? All you farmers that were complaining earlier about paying 1.25 an acre almost 2 centuries ago that is. There are so few of you so it's okay you get aid right? Because you always have. And it's okay. Right...
-- Posted by happypappies on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 12:26 PM
happy... you appear to be anything but!
Who was complaining... I think it was more to enlighten people like yourself who didn't seem to know any better.
In as much as you seem to have little use for the area or its's people and you have only been in SEMO for two years, what keeps you?
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 12:32 PM
There was a time when a small family could eke out an average living on a 40 acre farm and a family with 8 or 10 children could become wealthy on 300 acres.
What does government consider a small farm now days?
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 12:35 PM
I think Ike/Spaniard's account has been hacked. His recent posts have lacked their usual fervor...
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:29 AM
I think he is starting to see the light.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 12:38 PM
common: You wrote, "That is exactly what President Obama proposed and would have preferred. Picture this scenario: In 2010 Congressional leaders get together on a bi-partisan basis and hammer out an agreeable plan that is relatively simple in format, reins in insurance companies, is good for small business, covers more people, increases numbers of American covered by private insurance, etc."
Except, that isn't what happened, is it? No. Pres. Obama, Pelosi, and friends pulled this thing out of - well, let's not get anatomical - and shoved it and the vote on it down the throats of the American people, against the wishes of a majority of the people by the way - without it even being READ by most people in Congress! So much for "bipartisanship" in the Obama Administration! Kept those Republicans "in the back of the bus" just like the President said, didn't they?
Does it not disturb anyone that the enforcement of the requirement that we all carry insurance rests with the IRS? If you have ever been audited - it would! Their findings are final - unless you can afford a very expensive lawyer - and they NEVER make mistakes!
-- Posted by Little_Mac on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 2:12 PM
"...the vote on it down the throats of the American people, against the wishes of a majority of the people by the way - without it even being READ by most people in Congress! So much for "bipartisanship" in the Obama Administration! Kept those Republicans "in the back of the bus" just like the President said, didn't they?"
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
You appear to have made several highly questionable assumptions:
First you claim that it was against the wishes of the "majority" of the people. As you may recall there were numerous polls and the results were literally all over the map. There only things that were certain is that the majority of Republicans were against it, and that the majority of Americans were in favor of the majority of provisions of the bill. Today about one third of the people want it repealed, a third want it left alone, and one third want it fixed. Other polls show that 85% of the people like aspects of the current law. Why should Congress make decisions this year based on debatable and ambiguous polls from over a year ago.
Secondly, neither you nor I know how many members of Congress actually read the bill. I would suggest that almost no members read every bill, deferring to their staff members to provide detailed summaries of key points, and basing their decisions on those condensed versions.
Thirdly, and this is most crucial, you are making the assumption that the Republicans wanted a successful, bi-partisan bill to pass with large margin in both chambers. As I mentioned before, that would have handed the President a massive success, and was a step the GOP could not bring themselves to take. It is easy to claim bi-partisanship if you take a position that is wholly unacceptable to the other side, such as the Republicans insistence on scrapping the entire bill and starting over. Obviously it is easy for the Republicans to make similar accusation against the Democrats. But keep in mind, that a good bill acceptable to all would have been a definite "win" for the President and a "win" for the American people, but a total "loss" for the GOP. It is my contention that the Republicans made a conscious political decision to "just say no" last year, and they are going to have to sleep in the bed this year, that they made in 2010.
As far as enforcement by the IRS, they are not going to hire 16,000 new agents, and if you have insurance, what do you have to be concerned about?
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 3:19 PM
if you have insurance, what do you have to be concerned about?
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 3:19 PM
See... You dont even know.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 3:28 PM
It is certainly amusing to hear someone lament the lack of "sources" then proceed to offer tripe with NO sources or some very slanted. biased sources.
Here's some fact checking from Politifact.com, a non-partisan, Pulitzer Price winning source. It also speaks to the tactic of repeating a lie over and over to mislead the electorate;
PolitiFact's Lie of the Year: 'A government takeover of health care'
By Bill Adair, Angie Drobnic Holan
Published on Thursday, December 16th, 2010 at 11:30 p.m.
Related rulings:
The Democrats' health care reform law is a "government takeover of health care."
Robert Hurt, Monday, December 13th, 2010.
Ruling: False | Details
Says "Tom Barrett supports a government takeover of our health care"
Rebecca Kleefisch, Wednesday, October 13th, 2010.
Ruling: Pants on Fire! | Details
The Democratic health care plan is a "government takeover of nearly 20 percent of our economy."
Republican Party of Florida, Friday, March 19th, 2010.
Ruling: Pants on Fire! | Details
The Democratic health care plan is a "government takeover of our health programs."
C.W. Bill Young, Saturday, February 20th, 2010.
Ruling: Pants on Fire! | Details
The claim that the Democratic health care law is a "government takeover of health care" is our 2010 Lie of the Year.
In the spring of 2009, a Republican strategist settled on a brilliant and powerful attack line for President Barack Obama's ambitious plan to overhaul America's health insurance system. Frank Luntz, a consultant famous for his phraseology, urged GOP leaders to call it a "government takeover."
"Takeovers are like coups," Luntz wrote in a 28-page memo. "They both lead to dictators and a loss of freedom."
The line stuck. By the time the health care bill was headed toward passage in early 2010, Obama and congressional Democrats had sanded down their program, dropping the "public option" concept that was derided as too much government intrusion. The law passed in March, with new regulations, but no government-run plan.
But as Republicans smelled serious opportunity in the midterm elections, they didn't let facts get in the way of a great punchline. And few in the press challenged their frequent assertion that under Obama, the government was going to take over the health care industry.
PolitiFact editors and reporters have chosen "government takeover of health care" as the 2010 Lie of the Year. Uttered by dozens of politicians and pundits, it played an important role in shaping public opinion about the health care plan and was a significant factor in the Democrats' shellacking in the November elections.
Readers of PolitiFact, the St. Petersburg Times' independent fact-checking website, also chose it as the year's most significant falsehood by an overwhelming margin. (Their second-place choice was Rep. Michele Bachmann's claim that Obama was going to spend $200 million a day on a trip to India, a falsity that still sprouts.)
By selecting "government takeover' as Lie of the Year, PolitiFact is not making a judgment on whether the health care law is good policy.
The phrase is simply not true.
Said Jonathan Oberlander, a professor of health policy at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill: "The label 'government takeover" has no basis in reality, but instead reflects a political dynamic where conservatives label any increase in government authority in health care as a 'takeover.' "
An inaccurate claim
"Government takeover" conjures a European approach where the government owns the hospitals and the doctors are public employees. But the law Congress passed, parts of which have already gone into effect, relies largely on the free market:
* Employers will continue to provide health insurance to the majority of Americans through private insurance companies.
* Contrary to the claim, more people will get private health coverage. The law sets up "exchanges" where private insurers will compete to provide coverage to people who don't have it.
* The government will not seize control of hospitals or nationalize doctors.
* The law does not include the public option, a government-run insurance plan that would have competed with private insurers.
* The law gives tax credits to people who have difficulty affording insurance, so they can buy their coverage from private providers on the exchange. But here too, the approach relies on a free market with regulations, not socialized medicine.
PolitiFact reporters have studied the 906-page bill and interviewed independent health care experts. We have concluded it is inaccurate to call the plan a government takeover because it relies largely on the existing system of health coverage provided by employers.
It's true that the law does significantly increase government regulation of health insurers. But it is, at its heart, a system that relies on private companies and the free market.
Republicans who maintain the Democratic plan is a government takeover say that characterization is justified because the plan increases federal regulation and will require Americans to buy health insurance.
But while those provisions are real, the majority of Americans will continue to get coverage from private insurers. And it will bring new business for the insurance industry: People who don"t currently have coverage will get it, for the most part, from private insurance companies.
Consider some analogies about strict government regulation. The Federal Aviation Administration imposes detailed rules on airlines. State laws require drivers to have car insurance. Regulators tell electric utilities what they can charge. Yet that heavy regulation is not described as a government takeover.
This year, PolitiFact analyzed five claims of a "government takeover of health care." Three were rated Pants on Fire, two were rated False.
'Can't do it in four words'
Other news organizations have also said the claim is false.
Slate said "the proposed health care reform does not take over the system in any sense.' In a New York Times economics blog, Princeton University professor Uwe Reinhardt, an expert in health care economics, said, "Yes, there would be a substantial government-mandated reorganization of this relatively small corner of the private health insurance market (that serves people who have been buying individual policies). But that hardly constitutes a government takeover of American health care."
FactCheck.org, an independent fact-checking group run by the University of Pennsylvania, has debunked it several times, calling it one of the "whoppers" about health care and saying the reform plan is neither "government-run" nor a "government takeover."
We asked incoming House Speaker John Boehner's office why Republican leaders repeat the phrase when it has repeatedly been shown to be incorrect. Michael Steel, Boehner's spokesman, replied, "We believe that the job-killing ObamaCare law will result in a government takeover of health care. That's why we have pledged to repeal it, and replace it with common-sense reforms that actually lower costs."
Analysts say health care reform is such a complicated topic that it often cannot be summarized in snappy talking points.
"If you're going to tell the truth about something as complicated as health care and health care reform, you probably need at least four sentences," said Maggie Mahar, author of Money-Driven Medicine: The Real Reason Health Care Costs So Much. "You can"t do it in four words."
Mahar said the GOP simplification distorted the truth about the plan. "Doctors will not be working for the government. Hospitals will not be owned by the government," she said. "That's what a government takeover of health care would mean, and that's not at all what we"re doing."
How the line was used
If you followed the health care debate or the midterm election -- even casually -- it's likely you heard "government takeover" many times.
PolitiFact sought to count how often the phrase was used in 2010 but found an accurate tally was unfeasible because it had been repeated so frequently in so many places. It was used hundreds of times during the debate over the bill and then revived during the fall campaign. A few numbers:
* The phrase appears more than 90 times on Boehner's website, GOPLeader.gov.
* It was mentioned eight times in the 48-page Republican campaign platform "A Pledge to America" as part of their plan to "repeal and replace the government takeover of health care."
* The Republican National Committee's website mentions a government takeover of health care more than 200 times.
Conservative groups and tea party organizations joined the chorus. It was used by FreedomWorks, the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute.
The phrase proliferated in the media even after Democrats dropped the public option. In 2010 alone, "government takeover" was mentioned 28 times in the Washington Post, 77 times in Politico and 79 times on CNN. A review of TV transcripts showed "government takeover" was primarily used as a catchy sound bite, not for discussions of policy details.
In most transcripts we examined, Republican leaders used the phrase without being challenged by interviewers. For example, during Boehner's Jan. 31 appearance on Meet the Press, Boehner said it five times. But not once was he challenged about it.
In rare cases when the point was questioned, the GOP leader would recite various regulations found in the bill and insist that they constituted a takeover. But such followups were rare.
An effective phrase
Politicians and officials in the health care industry have been warning about a "government takeover" for decades.
The phrase became widely used in the early 1990s when President Bill Clinton was trying to pass health care legislation. Then, as today, Democrats tried to debunk the popular Republican refrain.
When Obama proposed his health plan in the spring of 2009, Luntz, a Republican strategist famous for his research on effective phrases, met with focus groups to determine which messages would work best for the Republicans. He did not respond to calls and e-mails from PolitiFact asking him to discuss the phrase.
The 28-page memo he wrote after those sessions, "The Language of Healthcare 2009," provides a rare glimpse into the art of finding words and phrases that strike a responsive chord with voters.
The memo begins with "The 10 Rules for Stopping the 'Washington Takeover' of Healthcare." Rule No. 4 says people "are deathly afraid that a government takeover will lower their quality of care -- so they are extremely receptive to the anti-Washington approach. It's not an economic issue. It's a bureaucratic issue."
The memo is about salesmanship, not substance. It doesn't address whether the lines are accurate. It just says they are effective and that Republicans should use them. Indeed, facing a Democratic plan that actually relied on the free market to try to bring down costs, Luntz recommended sidestepping that inconvenient fact:
"The arguments against the Democrats' healthcare plan must center around politicians, bureaucrats and Washington ... not the free market, tax incentives or competition."
Democrats tried to combat the barrage of charges about a government takeover. The White House and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi repeatedly put out statements, but they were drowned out by a disciplined GOP that used the phrase over and over.
Democrats could never agree on their own phrases and were all over the map in their responses, said Howard Dean, former head of the Democratic National Committee.
"It was uncoordinated. Everyone had their own idea," Dean said in an interview with PolitiFact.
"The Democrats are atrocious at messaging," he said. "They've gotten worse since I left, not better. It's just appalling. First of all, you don"t play defense when you"re doing messaging, you play offense. The Republicans have learned this well."
Dean grudgingly admires the Republican wordsmith. "Frank Luntz has it right, he just works for the wrong side. You give very simple catch phrases that encapsulate the philosophy of the bill."
A responsive chord
By March of this year, when Obama signed the bill into law, 53 percent of respondents in a Bloomberg poll said they agreed that "the current proposal to overhaul health care amounts to a government takeover."
Exit polls showed the economy was the top issue for voters in the November election, but analysts said the drumbeat about the "government takeover" during the campaign helped cement the advantage for the Republicans.
Rep. Earl Blumenauer, an Oregon Democrat whose provision for Medicare end-of-life care was distorted into the charge of "death panels" (last year's Lie of the Year), said the Republicans' success with the phrase was a matter of repetition.
"There was a uniformity of Republican messaging that was disconnected from facts," Blumenauer said. "The sheer discipline . . . was breathtaking."
-- Posted by riverdog on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 5:11 PM
In case anyone decides to read Dog's cut and paste post.... would you please give the rest of us the Reader's Digest condensed version.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 5:38 PM
"i already have insurance . i don't need , nor want , cheap gov. insurance and resent being told i have to pay for cheap gov. insurance ."
If you already have insurance, why in the world would you think that you to pay for "cheap gov. insurance." Obviously you do not have to buy additional insurance.
The paranoia that afflicts a number of the characters in these columns must be more contagious than usual. The "government takeover" myth was clearly exploded above. The IRS will have nothing to do with health insurance until 2014 and even then all they will do is confirm whether or not you have it. Furthermore, by then we could easily have a better way of getting everyone to have some coverage.
I find it hard to believe that people can be as obsessed and fearful in real life as they make themselves out to be here. It is sad to go through life constantly looking over your shoulder waiting for the evil government to pry another freedom out of your hands (and not recognizing when they're being messed with.)
-------------------------------------------
"...Reader's Digest condensed version."
That the government is going to take over health care is BS.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 6:04 PM
That the government is going to take over health care is BS.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 6:04 PM
You need to see what the insurance companies have plans to do. It will be inevitable and that isnt BS.
-- Posted by We Regret To Inform U on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 7:05 PM
There's no need in reading the lengthy cut-and-paste. Riverdog rejects as 'biased' the sources I used, - the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Government's Office of Personnel Management, and considers as 'authorative' a left-leaning newspaper's 'fact checking' site which asks opinions of a board of reporters and then tallies those opinions as fact.
The government _is_ biased, I'll grant you that, but when talking about how many employees it hires, I reckon it's more likely to produce an accurate figure than an un-named source.
Similarly, the House of Representatives is probably the best source for data on which spending bill have been passed by the House of Representatives.
I did use Wikipedia for the 2011 budget numbers, but only because they offer a concise summary of the spending numbers. I'm happy to provide a government link for that:
If you want to download all those PDF's to get the numbers and crunch them yourself.
The main thing is, Riverdog's lengthy post refutes the claim that 'Obamacare' is a federal takeover of health care. If someone made that claim that he is refuting on this thread, I missed it...
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 8:51 PM
Sorry, common ... but all the polls preceding the health care bill vote fluctuated very little above/below 64% against it. Of course, that is the total, not the breakdowns for blocks such as Democrats vs Republicans ... even the Dems, though, were averaging over 50% against, as they learned the few things we were allowed to know.
The latest polls still show the majority against it ... The numbers would be probably higher if those for 'keeping it' had enough brains to wonder why we have a massive bill that few have even admitted to reading it in its entirety, and which no one could possibly comprehend every single thing in it. I've never, ever seen a poll showing 85% on any of the issues ... where did that come from?
A health care bill may have been needed, may have been a good thing for the approximately 10% of those un-insured (including people who did not want insurance). The bill we have had foisted upon us is obscene in it's length and convolution, as well as in its mandates, including insuring one's grown children until the age of 26.
We do have to love, though, the fact that several hundred businesses have now been exempted from some of the bill's requirements because of the costliness to them. We seniors are delighted to know that the ridiculously-low Medicare Approval Rate will be further reduced in order to pay for this bill. Those who need insurance because of 'pre-existing conditions' would appreciate this part, except ... their rates will apparently be 50% or so higher than others' premiums.
Common sense certainly does seem to be lacking in many of our citizens ... even those who claim to have some, or maybe even honestly TRY to have some.
-- Posted by gurusmom on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 10:44 PM
Mom,
There is no point in challenging Common's numbers, he will show no sources and just keep on posting as if he were correct.
A few days ago it was crazy numbers being thrown around on gun ownership and crime statistics. None proven I might add.
There are a couple of other posters lately throwing unproven numbers around as if they meant something.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 10:59 PM
I'm just proud to be a "character".
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:15 PM
Old John,
You admittin to having an affliction.
I have to think about that for a bit before I own up to it.
Some of these posters thowing around these conjured up numbers need to know... You can go to hell for lying just as well as you can for stealing.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:30 PM
Wheels and Rick, I just skimmed through real quick and saw that reference to "characters".
I think I was the first to be called a character in response to one of my posts.
Now I am proud to be in company with you and others it was directed to.
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:44 PM
BC,
I wonder if the majority of Americans can handle it?
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:57 PM
Now I am proud to be in company with you and others it was directed to.
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:44 PM
Ain't too picky are you? ☺ ☺ ☺ ☺
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 21, 2011, at 11:59 PM
BC, I read fast and didn't see anything concerning the inflation that government and news says is not. Did I miss it?
That is the one thing several of us predicted and I think it is here despite what the "official" reports say.
-- Posted by Old John on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 12:00 AM
Wheels, Did you hear anything about the new rules and regulations on fishing off the Florida coast, something about a waiting period for a special license for non state residents? ;)
Just kidding Regret!
-- Posted by Old John on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 12:08 AM
And meanwhile earnings on savings is nil and wages dont keep up.
-- Posted by Old John on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 12:29 AM
THE AP-GfK POLL January, 2011
POSITION %
Total support . . . . 40
Strongly support . . . 21
Somewhat support . . 9
Neither support nor oppose . . 6
Total oppose . . . . . . . 41
Somewhat oppose . . 11
Strongly oppose . . . 30
Don't know . . . . . . . 3
This is just one poll and can even be interpreted in a variety of ways, but the "repeal" number as in "strongly oppose" is down to less than one third. The remainder of the people want it fixed, improved or left alone.
Actually what the poll really shows with a margin of error of 4.2%, is that there is a 95% chance that the true number of repeal supporters is between 34.2% and 25.8%. So there is only between a third and a quarter of people that favor repeal, meaning that Congress should quit wasting time on politics and get to work.
It would also appear to be a waste of time trying to correct misconceptions of the few. For example:
There is nothing in the bill that says you have to buy government insurance in addition to what you have.
The coverage of adult offspring to age 26 is not "mandated" it is only available if needed.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 7:01 AM
"China or Japan did not steal production from the US, it was forced on them by liberals and neoconservatives."
In the case of Japan, they produced better and better products, but the US has regained a lead in many areas recently.
China simply offered rock bottom wages. That coupled with efficient transportation enticed US industry to produce in China, to retain profitability and competitiveness.
Liberals and noeconservatives did not force anything on anybody.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 9:53 AM
Wheels, why would anyone continue to cite sources for you if you refuse to acknowledge the source? (i.e. provided source and link) You have a very unique form of tunnel vision. I am glad I am not on the road where you are driving!
-- Posted by Theorist on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 5:40 AM
Cannot bear to admit a mistake can you Theorist?
Oh, and about my perifial vision... when I was in Drivers Education a couple of years (50 something or other) ago, the instructor made me take that part of the test twice because he thought I was turning my head.
Even then I could see a far left wacko coming out of the corner of my eye better than most!
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 9:56 AM
"Regulations at a price that consumers were unwilling to pay."
Take a hypothetical product that uses $20 of material, 5 hours of labor at $20 per hour, and a $10 in overhead and "regulation" costs. The total price is then about $130.
Moving production to China with labor at $2 per hour, reduces the cost to about $40, before transportation. The savings to the manufacturor is about $80, which is why production moved. There is no amonnt of "regulation" that costs that much.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 11:14 AM
Regulation is not the reason things are imported from China although it plays a part. The reason is consumer demand for goods for less money.
As our friend of many names pointed out a good while back, if the products were identical with the only difference being labor cost, U.S. goods would compete well with imports.
More important is the lack of regulation in manufacture and product standards of importing countries.
Regulation and taxes have however, in my opinion, drove major corporations to be based out of the U.S.
-- Posted by Old John on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 12:50 PM
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 2:17 PM
Gee Wheels..you are losing it! I did admit my source was dated, did you miss that post too?
-- Posted by Theorist on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 6:05 PM
Dated, you never proved it existed. So after a week of waiting for a source.... I can only assume it never existed.
Theorist, you flatter yourslf thinking I hang on your words. I see what appears to be invented numbers thrown around, I want to see a source.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 6:18 PM
Rick, If you can afford your own insurance you can afford to donate your car to a charity.
The president will address your short comings in his upcoming State of the Union report.
It is the American way for all citizens to pitch in, to do their part in recognizing and continuing to fill the glass of opportunity that is always said to be, never half empty, but always half full. That is the heritage of this great democracy.
Recently this great president brokered a deal in which the Chinese government will invest more in America creating and supporting so many jobs you can't even count them.
All this while we raise the debt ceiling that the party of no has imposed to stop the progress of America in favor of the rich.
Hmm, I wonder if China has agreed to buy more American subsidized wheat to feed the poor over their in exhange for weapons technology to keep those nasty N. Koreans in check.
I only talk this way when she wont let me go south out of this weather like some get to do.
-- Posted by Old John on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 11:36 PM
I invited you down Old John. Want me to send you a note to give to your wife. ☺ ☺ ☺ ☺
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Sat, Jan 22, 2011, at 11:39 PM
That would only invite a list of what Regret calls honey do. In my case it would take till next winter.
-- Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 12:02 AM
If I pay for my own health care I have the final say in any medical decisions with the advice of the doctor/hospital of my choice.
If I choose to buy health insurance I delegate many of my health care decisions to the insurer. However, I still have the choice of doctor/hospital. If I desire/need health care my insurance policy does not cover I still have the option of purchasing this care out of pocket.
If I choose to delegate my health care decisions to the government, the government has the authority to decide what level of care I need; bureaucrats will make my decisions for me. They will have the authority to tell me where to go for care and how long I can stay there. The level of my health care will ultimately be decided according to the value I have to the government not according to the value I place on myself.
-- Posted by Robert* on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 7:56 AM
I think you have a grasp on the situation.
Common will be along in a short to tell you where you are wrong and how Obama and the government loves you and only wants what is best for you.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 8:31 AM
Far from claiming that you are wrong, I clearly recognize that you have every right to your opinion. Furthermore, there is no reason whatsoever, why the government need have anything to do with your health care. That is completely up to you, and you're perfectly free to handle it however you see fit.
When you decide to pay your own way you may end up paying higher prices. At least on my statements from medical offices or facilities, there is usually one amount, then an amount that insurance paid, a lesser amount that you pay, and an amount that is written off due to agreements between the provider and the insurance company. If you can afford to pay cash you are fortunate (many of us are not that well off) but may find you're paying the full rate. Incidentally, in paying all of the bill, you are probably subsidizing those that choose to forego insurance and get free care at the clinic.
As far as medical decision making by the insurer or the government goes, I have neither desire nor ability to change what anyone thinks. I can explain what my personal experience has been for the past 44 years. For about 28 of those years, on active duty in the USAF and retired but living near an Air Force hospital, I received full medical care from Air Force doctors and facilities which amounted to socialized medicine.
For the remaining 16 years, I had a combination of Champus and Tricare (private insurance run for the military) and lately Medicare. During that entire 44 year period I have never had any "bureaucrat" of any stripe interfere with my treatment or care. I really have no conception where this myth of "government bureaucrats" determining your care comes from. It has certainly not been my experience. I had one instance where a doctor asked for full payment first and then they filed for Tricare reimbursement, which may have cost me slightly more, but there was still zero involvement by any bureaucrat.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 11:03 AM
If a private company offers insurance with pay out based on certian amounts for certian procedures or services and you choose to purchase that coverage, it is free choice.
If the medical service provider chooses to accept payment from that insurance co wether in part or pricing services to match what that payment is, that is free choice.
A government plan that tells a private a medical insurance provider what they must cover and how much they must payout will end in the free choice of the company getting out of the insurance business [if not profitable] or the government nationalizing.
Of course in America we know the latter couldn't happen.....right?
-- Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 12:39 PM
"...you are already a Socialist..."
I am not quite sure how serving in the military makes me a socialist (that being the only reference I made to "socialism.") I do not favor government or societal ownership of all means of production and distribution. The best system is for individuals and private enterprise to fulfill that role.
I'm sure you remember the maxim, "I may not agree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it." Along that line, you have a right to your opinion, which I did serve to defend (albeit not to the death.) But saying I am "already a socialist" goes beyond expressing an opinion, it is making a statement that is not true. Your apology is accepted in advance.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 12:53 PM
Commonsensematters wrote:
"I am not quite sure how serving in the military makes me a socialist"
You all dress alike, you work a job assigned to you by higher authority, and your pay is not based on any free-market standards, but rather on longetivity and the number of mouths you have to feed. When I was in the Navy, we often commented about how Socialistic we were, given that we were supposedly the first line of defense against Communistic Socialism.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 3:56 PM
Under Socialism the goverment OWNS 100% OF THE MEANS OF PRODUCTION (Limbaugh fans can look up what that means). Lending money to auto manufacturers (which they paid back with interest...one of the most successful govt programs in history!)is not owning the means to production.
The word Facsism was coined by Musilini. He said the meaning was the "mingling of goverment and corporations".
Corporate lobbyists now write our laws. They have given significant tax advantages to themselves to move our jobs overseas. This is a main tenant of Reaganomics which we have sufferd under for 30 years (no, L fans, no one thinks Reagan is still in office but his policies, which Geo Bush rightly called "voo-doo economics, are still with us.
I think we need to scrap the Republican party and start over!
-- Posted by riverdog on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 4:22 PM
C-Span today aired Lyndon Johnson's 1964 State of the Union Address. ['64 was an election year for you Ron Emanuel fans] He outlined the war on poverty fought with entitlements, tax cuts and spending cuts on the federal level in his proposed budget. He also promised reducing federal employees and spending more on education.
His party championed and promised civil rights and delivered such in a progressive manner that pitted self reliant people against those addicted
to a nanny state to provide their basic needs.
Now we have people less educated, less productive, less self reliant and easily fooled into thinking goverment handouts to corporations were paid back with interest and that was the most successful government program in history, all the while they cry about corporate influence of government.
-- Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 6:14 PM
Theorist, Is a big snow that closes down the roads not still a big snow if no one measures it?
No need to beg to differ, you don't need my permission.
-- Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 7:20 PM
"...your pay is not based on any free-market standards, but rather on longetivity and the number of mouths you have to feed."
I don't really think that too many people go into the military with the intention of getting rich by "free-market" standards. However, the pay is based on rank which is obtained through performance. There are time in grade increases, as there are in the commercial world. There is a different housing rate for single and married individuals, but there was no extra pay based on the number of "mouths to feed."
"You all dress alike, you work a job assigned to you by higher authority..."
I would venture to guess that there are numerous "free market enterprises" that either have uniform requirements or the members dress alike due to peer or supervisory pressure. There are also very few "free market" activities where you do not have a job or duties assigned by "higher authority."
None of those aspects of military service really have anything at all to do with "socialism." I am very sure that you are well aware of this.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 9:12 PM
Common, Agree or not with your most recent posts, I must say I detect a bit of logic and reason.
Are you ill? :)
-- Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 9:21 PM
No and definitely not socialist, no matter what people that listen to ducks think.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 9:25 PM
Rick, He does quack like a duck, and sounds like a duck to me.
He likes Obama's nanny state plan.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 10:01 PM
Common, I once asked the professor: I passed the democrat pond and thought I saw duck, are there ducks in the democratic pond?
He replied, Just because it looked like a duck, sounded like a duck and swam like a duck is not to say it was a duck.
I asked another question: I went past the republican pond and didn't see, hear or smell a duck. Are there ducks in the republican pond?
He said, given the nature of the pond, there are definately ducks in that pond!
The professor's logic is what I see in many of the posters here.
-- Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 10:05 PM
You may want to find a different, more intelligent professor to listen to. The one you've got appears to be from the Limbaugh Institute of Conservative Studies.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 5:54 AM
Claiming that Democrats deny reality and Republicans get accused of problems that aren't real, is more of the black-white thinking that is pure conjecture. In the actual world, the feeling that Republican or white ideas are always right and Democrat or black concepts or approaches are always wrong, is a major misconception. Almost all issues end up being a mixture of shades of gray.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 9:17 AM
Common, Agree or not with your most recent posts, I must say I detect a bit of logic and reason.
Posted by Old John on Sun, Jan 23, 2011, at 9:21 PM
I take that back.
-- Posted by Old John on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 9:56 AM
Commonsensematters wrote:
"I don't really think that too many people go into the military with the intention of getting rich by "free-market" standards."
Nor did I suggest that they did. I merely pointed out that life in the military has many 'socialist' aspects. Socialism is defined as: " an economic and political theory advocating public or common ownership and cooperative management of the means of production and allocation of resources."
Clearly, the public owns and military men cooperate in managing the means of production and allociation of resources.
Since married persons in the military receive more pay than do single members, the pay is, indeed, based on the number of mouths you have to feed, to a point. In the Navy, in addition to housing allowances, married men received 'family separation allowances' on cruises lasting 60 days or more.
Many jobs have uniform requirements, when at work, but the military has uniform requirements when at leisure, as well. They do allow 'civvies', but you have to have permission to wear them.
This is not to put down the military, far from it. I served proudly, but I recognized that those who protect our freedoms are less free than the people whose freedoms they defend. When I was in, we were considered the front line against communist aggression, a role which has become somewhat secondary to aggression from other fronts. Even so, we lived a lifestyle that was, in some ways, more 'communistic' than some of the communist nations we were supposedly standing against. Again, it went with the job.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 10:00 AM
"...common ownership and cooperative management..."
I seem to recall that GI's were pretty close to serfs and had little, if any, sense of "ownership" of their organizations. The commanders are obviously in charge, and there is minimal semblance of "cooperative management." This is most obvious in the case of the virtual dictatorship of Naval ship captains, with which you may be familiar.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 11:36 AM
"I take that back."
Thanks, but neither the statement nor the retraction were necessary, considering ....
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 11:41 AM
Of course socialism and fascism are two completely different things...I don't recall saying that Mussolini "owned the means of production". That fact is that he thought that the mingling of business and corporations was a good idea. In the west we disagreed until Reagan appeared with his (or whoever was manipulating him)"trickle down theory" of goverment. The thoery holds that if all the capital is given to the wealthy and the corporations that some of it would "trickle down" to the rest of us. Geo Bush Sr correctly called this "voodoo economics".
The fact that anyone "creates" jobs is ludicrus. Noone or nothing just creates jobs out of the goodness of their hearts. The people provide needed labor so that the people can make a paycheck and companies can make more money.
The old cannard about the rich not "creating" jobs if they are taxed too much is pure BS. Making money is what they are ALL ABOUT. They would continue to make money if all their money was taken away.
We just went through 10 years of tax cuts for the wealthy. How many jobs did they "create" during that period?
-- Posted by riverdog on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 6:45 PM
Here's an idea...
All people who drop out of school should not be allowed to receive welfare benefits, public assistance, food stamps, or free health care.
See most of the people on assistance already have a health care plan that is free - it is called the middle class taxpayer.
America is one of the only countries that provides a free education for everyone. Many students don't try. Their teachers are held accountable for their lousy test scores - not their parents.
Break the cycle of a free ride because you don't want to work or you can't work at your dream job. Drop out - no welfare.
If you don't work, you shouldn't eat the same food as me, drive the same car, or wear the same clothes.
People the American middle class is TIRED of carrying YOU.
-- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:07 PM
Juste me,
I only disagree with you on one point. That would be the food. They could eat the same food as us.... or dog/cat food, whichever is cheaper.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:13 PM
Have Wheels... I'm tired of going to Wal Mart and watching people pay for their groceries with their assistance card, and then cash. What are they buying junk food. The winner - cash to pay for cigarettes.
Here's the deal - should you be able to eat what you want? Yes absolutely. Should you be able to work for what you want - yes you also deserve that.
I'm excluding assistance due to illness from this discussion.
People deserve lots of things and working for what they need is one of things.
-- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:25 PM
There has been a lot of discussion on these threads about the government not making any demands on citizens as it relates to Obamacare.
Reading a little of the information in the link below will only assure you that government agencies never, never, ever, never put demands on States, Counties, Cities and Towns or even citizens.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 1:11 PM
I recently heard something about the feds calling for better definition of how much authority county sherifs have regarding state and federal agencies and investigations in their jurisdiction.
I suspect it will be sold as protection for county jurisdiction while establishing more control by federal rules and such.
I don't have a link to this and I may be all wrong.
-- Posted by Old John on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 1:28 PM
Nope has nothing to do with minimum wage laws. I've worked minimum wage jobs. Do you know what it did for me? Made me realize I needed more education to get a better paying job. What I'm saying is that if you don't work in a job that pays you to eat filet mignon - then you don't get to eat it.
I'm saying when people who sit on their butt's and choose not to work because they don't like their job and then expect me to bust my butt working to feed my family and them - they can get off their butt and go to WORK. Don't like your job? Then work and get more education and skill. Yes, this means you may have to give up free time, but that is the way it is.
I'm sick, sick, sick of paying for people to sit on their behinds while I pay for it. If I could direct where my taxes went, I would gladly pay them without resentment. Where would I direct them? Our infrastructure, care for the elderly or infirm, and to our educational system - specifically student resources.
Where would I not direct them? To medicaid for people who can WORK, food stamps for people that can WORK, and finally money - outright cash - for people who can WORK.
-- Posted by juste_me_ on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 5:23 PM
Here's a real story for you...
I pay for insurance for myself and my family. My employer has a program. For a family of five, we pay $635 a month premium for a so-so plan. That is our share of the cost.
I go to Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes-Jewish. My physician orders an MRI for a check up to see if my cancer has recurred. (I used to get those every six months. I can't afford the co-pay so I now get them yearly and hope my blood work catches anything that might show up.)
My oldest son is getting engaged the evening of my physician's appt. My physician orders an MRI, asking that it be done that day. They can't get me in until 5PM at the earliest. I go to the MRI imaging center (same place) and ask if they can get me in earlier, offering to sit and wait all day for a cancellation. I don't want to miss my son's surprise engagement. (As a cancer survivor, this is what I'm living for - times with my family.) They take my insurance card information. The person at scheduling says she will check with her supervisor. I'm sitting there. The guy next to me is also checking in. He is using medicaid.
The receptionist gets off the phone and says we will work you in. This guys says loudly to the receptionist, "You mean you're going to work her in when I have an appointment?"
I said, "I guess they are and I'm grateful. See I'm actually paying for my appointment and apparently yours too." He had no comment.
Do you understand how angry the average tax paying hard working American is becoming?
There are people who think they are entitled - they are at the top and at the bottom of income. What is happening to the average American? We are being squeezed like the juice out of an orange. Eventually, there isn't going to be anything left. Then what people?
-- Posted by juste_me_ on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 5:39 PM
Just me, just curious, you say your son was scheduled to get engaged and you didn't want to miss his surprise engagement. How does that work?
I'm nor asking for any other reason but curiousity.
I understand your frustrated thoughts. I would have less problem with helping folks out if I didn't see so many living more carefree than I do.
I personally know some folks that are decent and likable people that get help. But they always have name brand food and clothes and money to take several pets to the vet and groomers.
I rarely buy top line meats and it ain't beyond me at all to shop at Teen Challenge or other thrift stores.
I saw a small beef tenderloin in the store priced at over $100 the other day. Even if I could afford that I would buy something durable instead.
I work a part time near minimum wage job for some spending money and something to do. I am around a lot of young folks that have children [a lot of single moms] and they all have the latest cell phones. I don't want one of those internet phones, but even if I did want one I wouldn't pay that much for something I didn't need. And most of these young folks have no chance of moving up in their jobs until they put the dang phone down and do the work they were hired for.
-- Posted by Old John on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 11:22 PM
"... we have people less educated, less productive, less self reliant ..."
Well ... yes we do. From my grandparents', parents', my, my children's and my grandchildren's generations, it is (or should be) fairly apparent that each generation of Americans has become, as a whole, less educated, productive, self-reliant.
All we have to do is read our standing in the world in education ... Okay, I have nothing on productivity ... Believe me, reliance upon themselves has diminished. Not all of course ... but there's no doubt in my mind that most of us could not have weathered well what our grandparents had to ... and that our children and grandchildren could not weather well what we did.
Education is at the point where at least the first year of college is mainly dedicated to teaching either the things that the students weren't taught, or didn't learn, in high school. Many high school graduates don't seem capable of putting together a grammatical paragraph, know little or nothing about geography, history, science, civics ... College professors who cannot write grammatically, or sometimes not even spell correctly?
-- Posted by gurusmom on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 11:33 PM
Gurus, Sometimes I think we should just add a year to the public school term to shake out those that are qualified and want to go higher in education.
-- Posted by Old John on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 11:42 PM
BC,
It might... if they were to spend that extra year in a one or two room wood frame schoolhouse, with a teacher who didn't understand their civil rights.
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:17 AM
"For most of the past 20 years I have served on selection committees for the Rhodes Scholarship. In general, the experience is an annual reminder of the tremendous promise of America's next generation. We interview the best graduates of U.S. universities for one of the most prestigious honors that can be bestowed on young scholars.
I have, however, become increasingly concerned in recent years - not about the talent of the applicants but about the education American universities are providing. Even from America's great liberal arts colleges, transcripts reflect an undergraduate specialization that would have been unthinkably narrow just a generation ago.
As a result, high-achieving students seem less able to grapple with issues that require them to think across disciplines or reflect on difficult questions about what matters and why."
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:59 AM
I have heard Limbaugh mention on may occasions that "all college professors are liberal"
Have you ever wondered why the very educated seem to be more liberal in their thinking?
Of course I have also heard the old connard that they lack experience in the "real world", but, of course, those of us who have been paying attention know many "college professors" who have been very successful in business and investing. I personnally know four that run very successful businesses and three who are quite "wealthy" from investmants, so what's the real answer?
-- Posted by riverdog on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 12:02 PM
Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach. Those who can't teach, teach at liberal colleges.
The 'very educated' are not necessary more liberal in their thinking. Most business leaders are 'very educated'. Those who seek the security of tenured teaching positions tend to be more liberal, because liberalism tends to be averse to taking risks.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 12:42 PM
Sorry this IS going to be a bit long. I have several points that I would like to get across to the Juste-Me person.
1. All people who drop out of school should not be allowed to receive welfare benefits, public assistance, food stamps, or free health care. -- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:07 PM
a. I was a dropout! HOWEVER, I went back and tried to finish. RE-quit but I went and completed my GED. TOP of my class and if I had not of gotten the ONE wrong that I did I would have gotten a scholarship. However, I did get one wrong so my score was 299 instead of the 300 to get said scholarship. Does that still mean that I can't get help in your world?
2. America is one of the only countries that provides a free education for everyone. Many students don't try. Their teachers are held accountable for their lousy test scores - not their parents. -- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:07 PM
a. How do you consider the "education" free? Every single person who pays property taxes PAYS for that education. Plus unless you are one of those who qualify for "free and reduced" lunches you have to pay for that too or bring your lunch.
3. If you don't work, you shouldn't eat the same food as me, drive the same car, or wear the same clothes. -- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:07 PM
a. What is it that is so different in food? Do you go buy the high priced things? I know I can't afford those! Car? WHO CAN AFFORD A DANG CAR? I have to beg a ride to get anywhere. Clothes? Why shouldn't everyone get to wear the same clothes unless you are wearing Armani or some other bull like that? Everyone DESERVES to have these things.
4. I'm excluding assistance due to illness from this discussion.-- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:25 PM
a. Does that include those of us who worked as long as we could and ended up on Disability or SSI?
5. People deserve lots of things and working for what they need is one of things. -- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:25 PM
a. I agree, but what about those who worked and got jack? Personally I have worked since I was 15 (Legally that is) and ended up on SSI. DO I like it? HECK NO! But I have kids to raise and since I can't get hired (Tried for almost 9 years to get hired after all the bull.) I do appreciate the help I do get to keep a roof over their heads and food in their bellies.
6. I'm saying when people who sit on their butt's and choose not to work because they don't like their job and then expect me to bust my butt working to feed my family and them - they can get off their butt and go to WORK. Don't like your job? Then work and get more education and skill. Yes, this means you may have to give up free time, but that is the way it is. -- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:25 PM
a. AS much as I agree with that statement Juste Me, there is a huge discrepancy in your thinking of it. At the wages of today and the amount that actually comes home minus the amount to put your kids in day-care, you get out of it less than a take-home pay. That is why some mothers go on welfare. I have several friends in Cape that "rob Peter to pay Paul" each month. Their kids don't wear "Designer" clothes. Half the time they pull the clothes from family and friends as "Hand-me-downs" or through Freecycle. IF they manage to get something that is considered Designer it is but luck of the draw or better-off-to-do family that for some reason decided to give the items to family instead of putting it in a resale shop! Or they resorted to stealing. Most folks who work at the re-sale shops who have small children get a first run at the new items. Heck there is a well-known store in Cape and Jackson where the "employees" get first dibs at the FREE clothing and then sell it at a good sized profit. But I am getting off tangent here.
b. Suffice to say that IF you actually sat down with some of the folks that are on assistance, you would find that they don't want to be on it. Unfortunately there are quite a few that would rather sit on their behinds and do nothing and it seems that we ALL are to be still judged by those.
7. Where would I not direct them? To Medicaid for people who can WORK, food stamps for people that can WORK, and finally money - outright cash - for people who can WORK. -- Posted by juste_me_ on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 5:23 PM
a. Medicaid is needed even for those who DO WORK. Do you know how many folks can't afford medical even when working? All those "Helps" are there to help those in need. I mean, what about the families that are struggling and are getting laid off? Where are all these jobs that you obviously must see somewhere? I rarely even see the junk jobs anymore around here. You know those jobs that are "Just perfect for our illegal immigrants." I know folks that would give their all for a job like that.
I know one lady that JUST so that she has a roof over her and her child's heads; watches other children who HAVE NO MANNERS. She gets paid very little, but it is just enough to pay her rent each month. Her child has NO nice things, for Christmas she only got what was given to her from a group she belongs to and the S-V-A Santa. She can't scrimp and save anything because there is NOTHING to scrimp and save! Does she "deserve" to have help? Well according to the STATE she doesn't. She makes 50 cents over the limit to get her daughter Medicaid! She just barely manages to keep the rent paid, but that makes her ineligible for the Medicaid how is that? How would she be able to go back to school to better herself; Juste Me? These are the people that the services were meant to be set up for. I agree if you can work, and there IS work even junk jobs...GO WORK, but to say that EVERYONE that is getting help doesn't deserve it is bull. Maybe you live in your ivory tower with your views, but I have lived the life and seen with my two eyes what goes on. Yes, I have seen those who abuse the programs, but I have also seen those who needed it most be denied and had their children stripped from them in the process.
-- Posted by Angel of Misrule on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 1:35 PM
Theorist wrote:
"Hmmmmm..the very educated seem to be more liberal...hmmmmm...
Could it be that they have learned something??"
No. Do not equate education with intellect, they are not the same thing. "An educated idiot writes his nonsense in better language, but it is still nonsense." So said Benjamin Franklin over 200 years ago, and it is still true today.
Chiang Kai-Shek said many ages ago that educational facilities were prime recruiting grounds for revolutionaries - that is where you find students full of p**s and vinegar, ready to fight for a cause. They don't even have to believe in the cause, they just have to believe that it will bring about change. They're always unhappy about the current state of affairs, always ready to change it.
Schools are full of well-written nonsense being passed off as knowledge. A sizeable percentage of educators believe the nonsense and thus propogate it as knowledge. Another percentage, methinks, knows that it is nonsense but see it as a means to an end. Liberals are not at the colleges and universities to tap into the wealth of knowledge found there, they are there to tap into the p**s and vinegar found there - to use generational angst (to the use the parlance of the day) to further their agenda towards building a society that keeps them funded.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 2:23 PM
I understand your frustrated thoughts. I would have fewer problems with helping folks out if I didn't see so many living more carefree than I do.
I personally know some folks that are decent and likable people that get help. But they always have name brand food and clothes and money to take several pets to the vet and groomers.
I rarely buy top line meats and it ain't beyond me at all to shop at Teen Challenge or other thrift stores.
I saw small beef tenderloin in the store priced at over $100 the other day. Even if I could afford that I would buy something durable instead.
I work a part time near minimum wage job for some spending money and something to do. I am around a lot of young folks that have children [a lot of single moms] and they all have the latest cell phones. I don't want one of those internet phones, but even if I did want one I wouldn't pay that much for something I didn't need. And most of these young folks have no chance of moving up in their jobs until they put the dang phone down and do the work they were hired for.
-- Posted by Old John on Tue, Jan 25, 2011, at 11:22 PM
I know what you mean OJ. While I may be getting assistance, I still help out those who are even less fortunate than I. I participate in a group on-line called Cape FreeCycle. Through this group we help others and ourselves. Instead of throwing away something that you have no use for you post it and if others need it they write back to you.
I have to say that if Teen Challenge would bring a branch over here to Jackson I would gladly shop there too. Their prices are a heck of a lot better than SVA's!
That kind of price for meat? They must think the rich are shopping there! LOL I prefer to buy mine at Fruitland Dressed meat OOPS they changed the name to American Fruitland Dressed Meats. Can't forget that. Yes, the prices are vastly different and so is the meat quality. The prices (At least 3 months ago) were lower than Wal-Mart and the meat was a darn sight better than SAL! I don't have to worry about the meat spoiling in 2 days if I forget to parcel it out and freeze it right away. Plus you can always pay a bit more to get individual pkgs. Otherwise I get most of my food at either SAL or Wal-Mart. Can't afford to get much at Wal-Mart, but some things just are not available at SAL. But then again the prices there are now starting to catch up with Wal-Mart anyway.
Cell phones..have myself a nice pay BEFORE you go phone. It's for emergencies since I can only afford to get a card for it every 3-4 months! You won't see me WALKING around with it glued to my ear! Yes, I said walking. Can't afford a car and if walking was good enough for the past it is good enough for me. Yes, that does mean that I have to beg/ask for a ride when I want/need to do something that I can't walk to, but that is what friends are for... Nes ce' pas?
Plus you know; most kids today are sent to these public schools where they are trained to NOT listen to their parents that Mom and Dad are wrong, the State is right and they deserve the best and are to have it handed to them. Plus the schools tell them that the bible is bad it is Hate literature, that those who follow it are terrorists, that homosexuality is good...etc., so why would the kids have any morals and work ethic after they get through 13 (if not more)years of it? After the kiddos get through all the years of mind control they think that they don't have to do anything to get what they THINK they deserve. Whereas in China and Japan they have to fight to even get into high school. Only the best get into the good schools. The rest are out of luck. THAT is why they are now doing much better than we are in education. The students are told that they must be their best or they will not be able to continue their education. Parents are given "Honor" if their children get into a good school. Only those who manage to get into the "good" schools have a chance to go to University. The rest are factory workers and such. China I really couldn't give a care about, but Japan has taken our original ideals and made them better, or perhaps we took theirs and made them ours. Our forefathers had great pride in their children and their homes. To have a child that did nothing was a great way for the child to get their behinds tanned. Now a days Big Brother and Big Sister says we can't correct our children. Of course they are not going to listen if there are NO consequences.
Well I quit before I make this into "Novel" length...
-- Posted by Angel of Misrule on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 2:38 PM
Did Albert go to the school of Hard Nocks?
-- Posted by Old John on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 6:07 PM
Old John - It was a surprise engagement. My son invited us. It was a surprise to his then girlfriend, now fiancee. Sorry I wasn't clearer.
To Angel of Misrule-
I'm glad you went back to school. My mom dropped out of high school in the sixties. She got her GED too. We were never on assistance. She did get a job filing papers in an office while she got her GED. Still the fact remains, poverty mindset, dropping out of school is systemic and cultural. It was for my mother. Something drastic has to be done to break the cycle. Ending funding for those who leave school is drastic.
Education is free in America. Every student is mandated to attend school for FREE. I did not say that no one pays for it, I am saying if a family turns down a free education, a student who is 17, turns down a free education there are consequences.
Please also consider that the taxes that pay for schools are majority funded by property owners, not renters. The kids who drop out of school are usually not from families that actually own their property.
You mentioned "Food?" Junk food is expensive. Cigarettes are expensive. People who take assistance should not be allowed to spend money on cigarettes. What do you think about that? They are spending my money on cigarettes and then I'm paying for their health care from pulmonary disease.
I spend every work day in my life around people who are on assistance. Don't tell me about kids not wearing nice clothes. My kids who have two employed parents dress worse than the kids I see who have two unemployed parents. SICK of that. And don't say that we don't know how to save our money. We budget our money and the American Eagle clothes are rarely in the budget. It is again the culture of poverty.
I said, "I'm excluding assistance due to illness from this discussion."-- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:25 PM
You said, "Does that include those of us who worked as long as we could and ended up on Disability or SSI?"
Yes.
I said, "People deserve lots of things and working for what they need is one of things." -- Posted by juste_me_ on Mon, Jan 24, 2011, at 8:25 PM
You said, "I agree, but what about those who worked and got jack?"
Life is full of crap. You have to get up again. What gives people the right to say "Hey this is lousy, I quit. You feed me, clothe me and my kid, and pay for needs????" I've had some real loser employers. I kept getting back up. Don't tell me about crap jobs because I've been there.
People should not expect to get things for free. Don't expect it and you won't be shocked when it doesn't happen.
You said, "Suffice to say that IF you actually sat down with some of the folks that are on assistance..."
I see people every working day that are on assistance. I KNOW THEM. That is why I'm tired of my money going to them.
You said, "Medicaid is needed even for those who DO WORK. Do you know how many folks can't afford medical even when working?"
It is called sacrifice and prioritizing. I don't have everything I want because I have to pay insurance. I buy second hand off of Craigslist. I was offered disability because of my ovarian cancer, I turned it down. I'm able to work. I'm doing the best I can for my kids and husband - without laying it on someone else - because WE are not anyone else's responsibility.
People who got laid off recently are not the problem. Systemic poverty mentality and system abusers are the problem.
You said, "Where are all these jobs that you obviously must see somewhere?" I think all people on assistance should have to work doing any task including picking up trash off the roads. You work for pay at a job or your work for nothing for welfare.
I am not in favor of employing illegal immigrants. I"m for deporting them.
-- Posted by juste_me_ on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 7:01 PM
Does comparing Oscar Wilde to Benjamin Franklin indicate the result of higher education or describe the mindset of our esteemed poster?
Tune in for the next "Theorist Speaks". Live Late Breaking, without commercial interuption! :)
-- Posted by Old John on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 9:51 PM
"The things that pass for knowledge I can't understand." - Steely Dan
"O ye Gods, give me not fullness of knowledge but fullness of undertanding." Heraclitus of Ephesus.
"
Neither would it be reasonable to assume it as proved, that Common Sense has been eclipsed for a generation, in every particular and every direction, because, during that time, public opinion accepted Mr. Gladstone as a statesman of the highest order. But it is matter of notoriety that almost everybody whose judgment is of much consequence, is now sharing in Mr. Arnold's doubts as to Mr. Gladstone's qualifications for statesmanship; and I fear I must observe that, not in the sphere of politics alone, but in the sphere of literature and literary criticism, in the sphere of art, in the sphere of social philosophy and social sentiment, Common Sense has been at a discount, and Nonsense at a considerable premium. Indeed, it would be a strange thing if men who uniformly talked nonsense and acted nonsensically in respect of politics, judged sensibly in respect of literature; if persons who admired the wrong politicians did not likewise admire the wrong books, go into ecstasies over the wrong poems, fall prostrate before the wrong pictures, gush over the wrong theories, and expatiate brilliantly on the wrong remedies for social disorders." - Alfred Austin: The Revival of Common Sense -
"Yet it seems to me, and has always seemed to me, that much, if not most, of what is written in the Spectator is nonsense; honest nonsense no doubt, well-informed nonsense, well-written nonsense perhaps, generous nonsense if you like, but nonsense all the same: matter from which the saving grace, the purifying salt, of Common Sense is unfortunately omitted." - Alfred Austin: The Revival of Common Sense -
Bitter? Hardly. Just tired. I've worked with educated idiots, those who know much but understand little. I've also known uneducated geniuses - who understood much though they knew little.
Silver in the mine is Silver, just the same.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:11 PM
Shapley, So do you understand every thing you know about what you understand about that?
Thanks for the post. I like the last quote.
At first I thought you were giving commonsensematters a hard time. :)
-- Posted by Old John on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:28 PM
I understand enough to know that I don't understand enough.
The Japanese have a proverb:
"If you undertand everything, you are misinformed."
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:35 PM
(That's supposed to be 'understand', of course. Nothing mars a good quote worse than a typographical error...)
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:36 PM
Nope ... even 4 more years wouldn't help, Old J. ... until and unless we go back to actually teaching children, especially solid subjects, rather than sort of just babysitting them ...
riverdog: "Have you ever wondered why the very educated seem to be more liberal in their thinking?"
My conservative-leaning son in college would beg to differ with that, in view of several of his liberal-leaning professors with Phd's who apparently are not as 'educated' as he is ... or the liberal Deans of Students I once worked under who were lucky to have secretaries to correct all their mistakes and/or write their correspondence. Interestingly enough ... the brightest and best-educated of all those Deans was a Black Conservative.
Perhaps it all boils down to 'very educated' not being necessarily what we once considered the 'norm' for that term?
It has bothered me for decades to see how some teachers (and gosh yes, even ministers) use their positions to influence students' thinking/opinions, in areas they should have no justification in doing so. This does happen ... will always happen, I guess.
-- Posted by gurusmom on Wed, Jan 26, 2011, at 10:41 PM
Shapley,
Please watch your typos. Theorist gets all bent out of shape when you spell Democrat incorrectly. Especially watch your P's and T's... I don't think we are redy for what would come next. ☺ ☺ ☺ ☺
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 12:12 AM
Ooops, that would be ready not "redy".
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 12:13 AM
"Please also consider that the taxes that pay for schools are majority funded by property owners, not renters. The kids who drop out of school are usually not from families that actually own their property."
Minor observation. Please keep in mind that the owners of rental units pay property taxes, a portion of the rent goes for that purpose, so renters also pay for schools.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 7:55 AM
"There is no free lunch". There is not even a reduced price lunch. It gets paid for, but not by the student attending, so it is a 'free' public education as far as he/she is concerned.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 8:05 AM
In the sixth grade I managed a way to help clean up in the school cafeteria in exchange for free lunches. I collected and saved the lunch money Mom gave me for all of a few days until Dad found out. That's when I learned the hard way about his pride, he considered it mooching off the school.
In the seventh grade I qualified for a program that allowed one class hour to be combined with study hour for the purpose of working a job related to the class hour subject which was vo-ag.
Dad had no problem with that because it wasn't costing the school any lunch money.
Some of the employers in that program took advantage of the cheap labor in exchange for filling out performance paperwork each month. I was lucky to work for a ma and pa business that paid me well enough that I stayed with them full time in the summer and returned to work there after attending trade school until hired in the field I sought.
Do they still have programs like that?
-- Posted by Old John on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 10:51 AM
Probably not, Old J. ... at least there weren't any such programs in any of the schools all my children attended.
I worked in our school cafeteria in grade school, for free lunches (for some reason, high-shool students weren't allowed to do that). It did not benefit me financially, though ... was a 'deal' the school made with low-income parents ... who had to pay the tuition, regardless of income.
Thinking that in our society as it is now, that sort of thing would be a no-no ... can't subject our children to what they'd now consider an embarassment.
-- Posted by gurusmom on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 11:07 AM
Theorist wrote:
"Where is your source?"
Here's one:
"When electrical engineer William Beaty was working on the design of an electricity exhibit for the Boston Museum of Science, he decided to check out some elementary school science textbooks in search of good ways to communicate fundamental concepts on the subject.
Bad idea.
What he found was a morass of misconceptions, mistakes and misinformation in one text after another. Not one of the books, he found, even contained what he considered to be a valid definition of what electricity is, much less how it works. And he discovered something else: Even his own understanding of the subject, despite his years in the profession, was flawed; he was still the victim of deeply-help misconceptions that he had learned in grade school.
''The majority of my misconceptions had been specifically taught to me,''
he said. ''[They] were in my science textbooks long ago, and they were still in most modern textbooks.''
Unfortunately, what Beaty found is not at all unusual. Scientists and educators say that many of the textbooks used today in US elementary and high schools contain significant errors, fabricated history, erroneous diagrams and misleading explanations. Beaty, in a lengthy Web page he set up to try to dispel scientific misinformation, cites examples of the kind of misleading claims about electricity found in numerous textbooks. For example, many texts describe an electric circuit as consisting of charges that come from a battery, flow through a wire, turn into light inside a bulb, and then flow into the battery's other terminal.
There are several things wrong with that story, Beaty explains. The charges are already inside the wire, not supplied by the battery, and they are not turned into light; if they were, they couldn't keep flowing. And this version leaves out the connection through the battery, where charges flow through and back out again.
Beaty suggests that a better approach is to use analogies that help clarify the fundamental concepts, such as this: ''A battery or generator is like your heart: it moves blood, but it does not create blood.''
Ambiguous or incorrect explanations of scientific phenomena may help explain why one new study, which has been submitted to the journal Science Education, found that students who had taken high school physics classes that used textbooks did substantially worse in college physics than those whose high school classes used no textbooks at all.
An earlier study by the same researcher, Philip Sadler of the Harvard Graduate School of Education and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, found that in some high-school science classes, students at the end of the year scored worse on their understanding of basic science concepts than they had before the class began. In typical high school classes, he said, ''The learning is minimal, and in some cases negative. Some kids have more misconceptions at the end of a course than at the beginning. ''
For example, Sadler said, at the end of the year in one class, more students than at the year's beginning thought that the sun was sometimes directly overhead in their town - despite the fact that there is no place in the continental United States where this is true (In fact, it only happens in the tropics.) And more students at the year's end than at the start thought the moon's phases were caused by Earth's shadow. (In fact, they're caused by the angle of the sun's illumination.)
Overall, as Sadler reported in the earlier study published in The Physics Teacher, whether students took high school physics or not had virtually no effect on college physics grades.
Some educators have traced the transmission of errors from one textbook to another and compare the process to the spread of a virus through a population. ''As in epidemics,'' wrote Beaty on his Website, ''a particular piece of information can spread exponentially: The more textbooks it occupies, the more likely other textbooks will be to acquire it.... The bad information can be spread just as easily as the good.''
The paleontologist and author Stephen Jay Gould wrote about the same problem a few years ago, referring to it as the ''cloning'' of bad information from one book to another. And it's not just the information itself, right or wrong, that gets copied, but often the sequence and the structure of a lesson, and even the use of specific comparisons. Even when not wrong, such copying can impede learning, he wrote.
For example, he cites the fact that virtually every textbook chapter on evolution begins by describing Lamarck's discredited ideas, even though most students may never have heard of the 19th century biologist, and ends by using giraffes' necks as an instance of natural selection, even though this is a dubious example.
All of this is certainly not a new problem. James Michener complained about the way school textbooks were written after a brief stint as a schoolbook editor back in the 1930s, writing that ''the entire educational process was watered down, level by level.'' And Richard Feynman wrote memorably of his experience with bad science texts in the 1950s in his bestselling memoir ''Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!'' After working with a California committee evaluating textbooks, he found
''that's the way all the books were: They said things that were useless,
mixed-up, ambiguous, confusing, and partially incorrect. How anybody can learn science from these books, I don't know, because it's not science.''
[Note: I used this link because you can read the article for free, You can Google the article to link to the original source, the Boston Globe, but they charge for the archive file.]
_________________
There are any of a number of sites that provide links to the many, many articles on textbook errors and misinformation provided under the guise of education.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 11:10 AM
Theorist wrote:
"Note Shap left out the wonderful things Beaty had to say about college texts."
What wonderful things are those? He was a reviewer of K-6 textbooks, so he focused his attention there.
Are you saying that's why we need to send kids to college, so they can 'unlearn' the misconceptions they were taught earlier. Why not just teach them the truth early on, and save billions on re-education.
Why, for instance, do we keep teaching that Europe is a continent, and Asia is a continent, which requires a very imprecise definition of 'continent' to uphold? Wouldn't it be easier to teach students that Eurasia is a continent, and that Europe and Asia are the principle divisions of that landmass? It would save a lot of difficulty later in life, and allow us to establish and hard and provable definition of the term.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 2:19 PM
"Why, for instance, do we keep teaching that Europe is a continent, and Asia is a continent..."
One of my old reference books include Eurasia as the continent. Europe has always been differentiated from Asia by an imaginary line running roughly north south near Moscow, but I have yet to see a reference to Europe as a separate continent.
Also if Beaty was reviewing K-6 texts, I don't see the simplifications as being that catastrophic.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 3:28 PM
Africa, Antarctica, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America, South America.
It has long been thus even though, as you note, it requires an imaginary boundary to separate Europe and Asia.
The concept originates, I believe, in our Eurocentric foundations, in which Europeans simply could not accept that they were Asians or Eurasians. They demanded their own continent, even if it meant they had to create an imaginary separation, and bend the defintion of 'continent' to permit it.
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Beaty considers them catastrophic, because it instills false understanding in the children which they have difficulty breaking later in life. They have to 'unlearn' things before they can learn the truth.
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College textbooks are a scam, in my humble opinion. Students are compelled to purchase them and then, as often as not, they are not even used in the classroom curiculae. This is well known. Additionally, the text requirements are updated frequently to avoid students passing (or selling) them to the next years' students.
This might make sense with such topics as computers and current events, but such things as Ancient History and Calculus could be taught with texts written 100 years ago without hampering the students' education. 'Great Books' universities do just that...
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 3:43 PM
''A battery or generator is like your heart: it moves blood, but it does not create blood.''
Even that suggested comparison is a bit simplistic. When a kid sees his battery run down, will that make him believe that his heart will run down just as soon?
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 4:24 PM
When I was in the Navy, we're taught 'electron flow', which states that current flows from negative to positive. Most of the officers, however, had been to engineering schools, where they were taught 'hole flow', which teaches that current flows from positive to negative. Thus, when engineers and non-engineers sit down to discuss circuitry, it can be confusing.
Mr. Beaty, takes umbrage with some of the most basic terminology, however, such as 'the flow of electricity' being used in lieu of 'the flow of current'. It's a problem that is difficult to overcome, because such terminology is engrained in our society. We all think electricity flows along the wires and into our homes. The comparison of electricity in a wire to water in a pipe is probably as old as the idea of current flow, 'current' being a standard term in both fields.
Mr. Beaty wants to correct the terminolgy, and beleives that it is best to do so early in life. His point is well taken, but it is akin to teaching people to quit talking about sunrises and sunsets, given that we know it is not the Sun that rises and sets, but the world that rotates creating such an illusion. We use the terms and they are a part of our everyday terminology much as is the idea of electricity flow.
However, we do not teach that the Sun rises and sets in Science class: that is where we set the record straight. He is merely asking that Science do the same in other arenas, as well. Just as we shouldn't teach young children that the Sun revolves around the Earth, and then try to unteach that later in life, so we should not teach known falacies in other disciplines, to be undone later only to those who seek to expand their knowledge into those disciplines.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 4:40 PM
"...akin to teaching people to quit talking about sunrises and sunsets..."
More tilting at windmills, methinks.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 8:06 PM
And you call that 'wonderful'? 'Uniformly accurate merely means they have the same level of accuracy.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Thu, Jan 27, 2011, at 8:09 PM
Shapley, All this about text books, does this mean the children are now taught there are eight planets now?
Common, What does tilting at windmills mean? I've heard the phrase but never had it explained.
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 28, 2011, at 12:41 AM
A senseless, hopeless or meaningless endeavor,(uses the word tilt as meaning a medeivel joust) from the Spanish book about Don Quixote, in which he, while riding, armed with his lance, sees windmills in the distance and being somewhat nearsighted, construes them to be dragons or monsters, and charges forward to do battle.
-- Posted by commonsensematters on Fri, Jan 28, 2011, at 6:50 AM
Old John wrote:
"Shapley, All this about text books, does this mean the children are now taught there are eight planets now?"
Yes. Pluto is now a 'planetoid'. I suppose some old-school teachers are rejecting the idea and, just as they retain Europe as a continent, they retain Pluto as a planet.
Pluto had to be downgraded, because one of the new 'planetoids' discovered beyond it is actually larger, and its discoverer named it Xena, after the fictional television warrior princess, and it's Pluto-sized moon was named 'Gabrielle', after Xena's sidekick. If Pluto was to be retained as a planet, we would have had to add Xena to the list, and political correctness could not tolerate that. Twentieth-century mythology does not have the same classic appeal to scientists as does pre-Christian mythology, apparently.
CSM,
I used the misnomer of 'sunrise' and 'sunset' to point to the type of falacial language Mr. Beaty is attempting to avoid. No one wants to get rid of the centuries-old terminology of Earth-centric solar cycles. To be sure, I've never heard an scientifically-accurate alternative even suggested. However, in electricity, where the terminology is only a couple hundred years old, and the misuse thereof even younger, Mr. Beaty feels there is time to correct the language and have properly educated citizenry using it correctly, lest accuracy ride off into the sunset, lost forever to future generations. I hardly think that is 'tilting at windmills'.
As I've noted, we teach children the truth about Sun in Science class, but we teach them fallacies about electricity. That is what he seeks to correct.
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At the college level, much speculation has become 'knowledge'. I've pointed fallacies regarding the War in Vietnam, often taught as factual. The idea that Leonardo daVinci was 'gay' (which means 'openly homosexual') is, of course, a falsehood. He may have been homosexual, we dont' know but, if he were, he was not open about it.
The idea that John Wilkes Booth shouted 'Sic Semper Tyrannicus' is often presented as fact when, in fact, it has always been in dispute. Just as is the case with Global Warming, err, Global Climate Change, teachers are using consensus as a foundation of fact.
-- Posted by Shapley Hunter on Fri, Jan 28, 2011, at 8:10 AM
Having spent my youth in the UK I hate to inform people that the majority of the British people actually like their system. The Obama-Care system is NOT a British style plan... it is forced 3rd party medical insurance (for profit).
Consider the idea of growing up knowing that if you went into hospital there would be NO bills, no phone calls (about items not covered by insurance), no harassing calls from collection agencies and no $150 drugs to collect at Walgreens. If you need take home medicine then there is a flat rate fee for prescriptions (in Wales they are even free). Getting well was never related to money.
So I regret to inform "We Regret To Inform U" that your media has painted the wrong picture of the UK's health system.
-- Posted by Tech_Dude on Fri, Jan 28, 2011, at 8:19 AM
Common, Shap, Thank's. I learned something.
-- Posted by Old John on Fri, Jan 28, 2011, at 9:47 AM
Tech Dude
You only left one thing out.
The Brits and their health care system are broke!
-- Posted by Have_Wheels_Will_Travel on Fri, Jan 28, 2011, at 9:53 AM
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I learned a long time ago if I saw a competitor do something that became a disaster not to do it myself. The future health care mandates are going to be a disaster and they know it. Duh?
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=12631311
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