Yes, anti-poverty programs do keep some people poorer than they should be

The last 20 years? Not hardly, really you need to go back to the late 1950’s to see the change starting. Corporations once had something called apprenticeships but now they rely on government to train their workers for them. Companies don’t want “employees” any longer. Corporations don’t want to provide benefits and soon we all will be considered “Part Time”. That started With ESRIA act of 1974, later NAFTA, and cumulated the (un) Affordable Health Care Act. All corporate welfare and that was all it is.

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Destroy the person?

What about the Nation that lies in total ruins?

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This is news only to left wing, socialist, progressive, liberals, commies and democrats! They are ignorant of the stupidity of their own political agenda! By trying to coddle everyone cradle to grave, they actually promote poverty and tax away money from the economy just to redistribute it FOR A FAILED AGENDA! The war on poverty has created an ever increasing level of those on poverty! So how do they fix it? They promote more and more of the same failed policies thereby creating more poverty! But, they have also created a larger constituency and brain dead voters for democrats! me thinks that was the purpose and outcome they wanted all along! Does not matter how many are in poverty as long as they vote democrat!

Their policies should be classified as criminal!

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This is absolutely true, and I would love to see some changes. The problem is that we don’t know the percentage of people that are caught in the web or taking advantage of the system. If its 5%, then we don’t have a problem. If it’s 25%, then we need serious changes. I doubt its that high though.

Either way, I think most reasonable people would make changes if the argument was made in a intelligible manner.

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You don’t sound caring, kinda sound greedy.

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JF McNamara: I think most reasonable people would make changes if the argument was made in a intelligible manner.
———————

The problem isn’t the argument, it’s the counter-argument…”Republicans want to push Granny off a cliff”…”Why do conservatives hate brown people”…etc. Libs are incapable of an intelligible argument when it comes to entitlements.

In any case, the recent election proved you wrong.

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Conservatives would have better grounds to affect change if they didn’t persist in calling the poor “parasites”, “leeches”, or “takers”. Conservatives would have better grounds to affect change if they wouldn’t persist in wanting to GUT anti-poverty programs! Conservatives would have better grounds to affect change if they didn’t persist in wanting to eliminate public education and replace it with the theological-based private paradigm which does nothing that indoctrinate rather than educate!!

Granted, there are changed that need to be made in anti-poverty programs; granted, there have been unintended consequences in many of these programs. If you want to affect change, then change the rules so that MARRIED people can partake of the programs….and incentivize it! Focus on job-training and education….which are the pathways to growing the workforce! Get CORPORATE AMERICA to bring jobs BACK to the US by eliminating the offshoring tax break!! THAT’D be the start……

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Only three Murray laws? This is such a great example of writing to stir the pot. Mr Kristof has a very pedantic way of describing the despised 47%. If he wants to investigate fraud let him get a job with the watchdogs. The absence of a viable GOP has obligated some writers to speak for them. Where was he during the campaign? Ghostwriters for Romney. These disenfranchised poor people are lucky our laws prevent the Wingfields from acting out these invented vendettas. If this were China those vulnerable folks would be in deep voodoo.

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HDB: Conservatives would have better grounds to affect change if blah blah blah
——————–

Conservatives don’t run the government…Democrats do.

Where is Obozo’s plan to reform entitlements?

The Republicans have one. Why don’t the Democrats?

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The closest definition of selling your soul for pennies without actually getting Lucifer involved in it.

Oh wait, what do obama’s buddies the islamic lunatics call the United States? The “great satan.”

Maybe they’re on to something.

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“most often as generation after generation within particular families grow up seeing nothing but dependency”
.
I read somewhere that Warren Buffet has a solid……….gold………….EBT card.

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I love this place too, where else can you witness, first hand, hysterical, guilt ridden, kleptomaniac, angry human trash sell whole generations of people into government slavery, while thumping their scrawny chests proclaiming how much more they “care” than anyone else.

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HDB, can you explain the alleged tax incentive for offshoring jobs?

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The Democrats as a party have been pretty much taken over by the far-left in this country. We have a president that believes more in fostering dependency than he does working toward creating an environment for the American private sector to recover and thrive, so as to create jobs for people rather than safety nets for people. As the federal government continues its uncontrolled growth therefore requiring an ever greater share of the nations wealth the population that’s dependent on government financial assistance will continue to grow. The so called fiscal cliff is a mole hill in comparison to the mountain we could fall off in the not too distant future. Maybe falling off this fiscal cliff could be what’s best for our nation as a far less painful wake up call than the pain should we go off the looming fiscal mountain.

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Lil’ Barry Bailout – OBAMAPHONE!!!

December 11th, 2012
8:05 am

You don’t have to INCREASE spending….you have to FOCUS it!!

This nation needs to repair its infrastructure…that is a given!! If we start there, this nation can come back to where we all desire it to be!

The preponderance of poverty is in places like Appalachia where education has been de-emphasized!! Focus on getting educational/job training facilities where they NEED to be!!

Elimination of governmental DUPLICATION would save money….and there is so much duplication….particularly in the MILITARY (start with procurement!)…………

Lest you forget, LBB…ALL governmental appropriations START in the House, changed in the Senate, and merged in conference committee….then re-voted upon by both chambers! Obstruction in the HOUSE is the greatest barrier now!!

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Here we go again Del, with the makers vs. the takers.

Keep it up, you know….since it worked so well last election.

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SBinF, truth doesn’t always do well in elections.

Giving away candy borrowed from the Chinese does, apparently.

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LBB…..here’s part of it!

….from USA Today:

“At issue is the U.S. tax code’s treatment of profits earned by foreign subsidiaries of American corporations. Profits earned in the United States are subject to the 35% corporate tax. But multinational corporations can defer paying U.S. taxes on their overseas profits until they return them to the USA — transfers that often don’t happen for years. General Electric, for example, has $62 billion in “undistributed earnings” parked offshore, according to recent Securities and Exchange Commission filings. Drug giant Pfizer boasts $60 billion. ExxonMobil has $56 billion.

The deferral clause has been in the tax code for more than half a century and has outlasted numerous reform efforts. In April 1961, even as U.S.-backed rebels were dying at Cuba’s Bay of Pigs, President Kennedy asked Congress to rewrite tax provisions that “consistently favor United States private investment abroad compared with investment in our own economy.”

In 2004, the Democratic nominee for president, Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., railed against “Benedict Arnold” corporations that exploited the tax system to outsource jobs to low-wage countries such as India.

Now, with ever-larger volumes of capital surging across national borders, corporations’ foreign earnings are emerging as part of a broad Democratic critique of globalization. States such as Ohio, where Clinton scored an important primary victory on March 4, and Pennsylvania, which votes April 22, have lost tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs in recent years. Trade agreements and a tax code that encourages corporate flight are to blame, many Democrats say. “We’re going to close every tax loophole that still gives one penny of your tax dollars to any company that exports a job,” Clinton promised last month.

From 2000 through 2005, U.S. multinationals eliminated 2.1 million jobs at home while adding 784,000 to their payrolls abroad, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. At the end of 2005, the most recent statistics available, U.S. corporations employed almost 9 million people outside the United States.

Whatever the employment impact, the deferral provision is costing the U.S. government money. A new study published in Tax Notes this month concludes that multinationals shifted almost $50 billion in income to low-tax countries in 2004, depriving the government of $17.4 billion in tax revenue. To recoup some of the lost cash, Congress in 2004 allowed corporations a one-time opportunity to repatriate profits at a special 5.25% tax rate. In 2006, corporations paid $354 billion in federal taxes.”

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Why do you call the Ronnie Raygun phone an Obama phone?

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Let’s add corporate welfare to the list. If corporations didn’t have the government to help sell their products overseas and give them the subsidies and tax write offs they currently get, maybe they would be more competitive in the global marketplace. To try and justify the elimination of safety net programs by trotting out some examples of negative result;, shows the true nature of the conservative movement. You have never been able to accept the New Deal. To you, government is a tool of the rich and the powerful. The constitution of “for the people” doesn’t mean everyone. 47% was not a statement made inadvertently.

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Entitlement reform? Good luck. Man its hard to text on a mobile ajc smartphone. The stupid thing “corrects” your text, and replaces entire words that it thinks you should have used! Texting software has been written by a clown act for the ages. We can’t edit every single mobile spelling over-ride that texting programs have built in. Especially if were multitasking while we’re multitexting.

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Mountain Man “In Dalton, the carpet mills used to be the source of jobs for the under-educated. Now it is Mexicans. Why? Not because they have decided to pay less – no, ”

I grew up in Dalton and worked for a summer at one of the factories before starting college. I was considered unskilled and my job was pulling scatter rugs off a conveyor at the end of a latex spray oven. Today, those jobs still exist in Dalton and to get even money to what I was paid, the jobs would have to start at $10.47 per hour. I have family in Dalton and I KNOW FOR A FACT that those low skill jobs do not pay anything near that. So you are wrong about why the jobs are being filled with immigrants rather than those lazy mountain folks who do not want to work for a living. It is always about keeping wages and benefits low and profits up. Not that there is anything wrong with profits, but let’s at least be honest about it.

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Darwin: To [conservatives], government is a tool of the rich and the powerful.

FDR: “Tax and tax, spend and spend, elect and elect”.

FDR was a conservative? Who knew!

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“Disability” is becoming a joke. Anybody who has a couple bad days can be declared bipolar and get signed up for disability. And yes, I do know several who have done just that. Their checks just keep rolling in. And they are all in their twenties, so the checks will be rolling in for a long time.

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Here is the key line in Kyle’s post:

“…can sometimes…”

So, we scrap all social programs and rely on the church and the tax-break deductions tied to charitable giving? Give me something – whether it be eternal life or a tax cut – and I will help these poor poor people.

That whole bible chapter where Jesus got his tax breaks too, that chapter was lost?

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A recent Forbes study identified 11 states in what Forbes calls the death spiral. These states have their majority population depending on Social Security, state and local government pension programs, government jobs or on some kind of federal government financial assistance. Their minority population are employed in private sector jobs. Their trajectory toward bankruptcy is the same as the nation only they’re getting there faster. Those states are Maine, New York, Ohio, Illinois, New Mexico, California, Hawaii, Kentucky, South Carolina, Alabama and Mississippi. The largest states with the greatest percentage of people on government assistance are the blue states of New York, Ohio, Illinois and California none of which have an Appalachian population.

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you have a corporate welfare program that benefits a handful of guys that contribute to a politicians re-election campaign.

You are correct, Solyndra is the perfect example, those execs all contributed to Barry’s campaign.

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While this article make Cons “feel better” in their alternate world, the facts are 1. this is not an epidemic 2. people has always been gaming the system since its inception and will continue to find ways to do so 3. this is not all black people in inner cities doing this.

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Del

Why no mention of the GDP of the blue states you mentioned vs the red states?

Or avg wage comparision?

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Rafe Hollister preparing for an Obamanist America

December 11th, 2012
9:28 am
“The reason companies hire contractors and no longer are willing to do training and spend money on education for their employees is intrusive government regulations. ”

Not true….companies don’t want to pay for employee benefits and desire to maximize profit!! The problem is, though, they’re actually paying MORE for contractors and LOSING their knowledge base!!

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Mr. Kristof doesn’t mention poverty within the inner cities. No need to wonder why.

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There was a work/welfare program in Milwaukee a few years ago that would provide credits for child care, food, health care, and a little extra spending money for recipients for every week that they could show verification that they worked at least 35 hours. For some people it made no change- they didn’t work the 35-hour weeks and passed on the benefits. Those people seemed destined to a multi-generational cycle of poverty. They were essentially addicted to welfare as a way of life. For many others it helped exponentially, and not only did their families flourish from the extra support that they would not have had otherwise, but they actually rose into the middle class. Except for the elderly and disabled, welfare should come with stipulations as a requirement for receiving aid.

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” truth of matter is most upper crust could be replaced in heartbeat by just as talented joes.”

Then do it vs complain about it. We choose everything we do, what’s stopping you?

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According to breckenridge @ 10:19, more Republicans are liabilities and more liberals are assets: http://taxfoundation.org/article/states-vary-widely-number-tax-filers-no-income-tax-liability

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Our military endeavors do rescue many people, but other times they backfire.

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Yes I did Kyle, and I put it in quotation marks as a quote, but I like to do it that way so folks will go out and do their own research in an attempt to educate themselves. Giving the link is sometimes counterproductive, but that is the daddy in me.

It’s a Stossel story.

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I see a whole lot of blame, but I haven’t read many proposed solutions.

It amazes me the amount of vitriol expressed against our elected leaders. If the populace is that unhappy with them, why aren’t there hundreds of people running for these offices? Why isn’t the ballot 200 names long for Council members, Mayors, and other representatives? That would seem to make sense wouldn’t it? You dislike who you get to chose from so much, get up there and run for office yourself.

I’ll listen to your proposals when you do that. Until then, you’re just yelling into the wind.

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To Rafe’s point, end the gargantuan and needless welfare for the super-wealthy and only then reign it in for the destitute, elderly, infirm and women and children.

It is the conservative thing to do.

Occupy that.

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For those discussing corporations and their hiring practices…. I would have a simple explanation:

The ‘people in charge’, the decision makers, the CEOs, etc. are rewarded on short term results. Heck, even the President is only looking for 4 years. When our leaders are only looking short term, we get the results that we now have.

Let’s look to sports as an example. The football coach at an U is looking to win the season. Rarely do they care about the team 3 or 4 years down the road. Mostly (especially at smaller schools) they are looking to make their mark in one or two years and then get a “promotion” to a bigger and better school or maybe even to the Pro ranks.

The same is for the management of companys. They are looking to maximize the profits for this year. Rarely do they look 3 or 4 years down the road. The CEO of a small company can make a record profit one year and then move one to a bigger company. The CEO of a bigger company wants record profits in one year to get that “big payout” of bonus, stocks, whatever. Do they really care about the company in 5 years? Rarely.

The same with them looking out for employees. The leaders couldn’t care less about losing the employee with knowledge. The employee is simple another widget that can easily be replaced. And, it is better to not “buy” the widget but “rent” the widget because then they don’t have to pay for or maintain records for benefits. When that “rented” widget is used up, dispose of it and rent another widget.

This is what is wrong with corporate America. The leaders look only to short term and also they are too involved with politics (another blog).

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Taken together, Murray’s post and Kristof’s column give us an important understanding about the fallibility of even well-intentioned government programs for the poor

The plural of anecdote is not data.

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“”There are no jobs!” That is what people told me outside a government “jobs center” in New York City.

To check this out, I sent four researchers around the area. They quickly found 40 job openings. Twenty-four were entry-level positions. One restaurant owner told me he would hire 12 people if workers would just apply.

It made me wonder what my government does in buildings called “job centers.” So I asked a college intern, Zoelle Mallenbaum, to find out. Here’s what she found:

“First I went to the Manhattan Jobs Center and asked, “Can I get help finding a job?” They told me they don’t do that. ‘We sign people up for food stamps.’ I tried another jobs center. They told me to enroll for unemployment benefits.”

So the “jobs” centers help people get handouts. Neither center suggested people try the 40 job openings in the neighborhood. “”

Jon Stossel

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More like the nice Aunt that takes you to Disneyland but uses the mean Uncle’s credit card. The mean uncle gets to pay the bill and the nice aunt gets to continue looking like the nice aunt.

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Here is the key line in Kyle’s post:

“…can sometimes…”

Exactly

But the Neo Cons, Kyle, and people of that ilk will gladly throw the baby out with the bathwater

With a big smile on their face.

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Meanwhile the economy is looking better and better.

DOW up over 100 points again today.

It took 4 years but we finally may have corrected the damage done by Dubya.

Obama has certainly got this thing turned around.

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“Give a man a fish and he will be not be hungry for a day; give a man a fishhook and teach him how to fish and he will not be hungry again.” I don’t recall who said that but it is a logic with which I basically agree. And my own personal observation has been that many welfare bureaucrats encourage dependency for whatever personal reasons they may have and view welfare recipients with disdain. Hardly an uplifting experience to visit one of those offices. Just read some of the descriptions used by poster td, who is a former DFACS employee, and views he has attributed to his wife, who is current DFACS employee, re this point. I would hope that Kyle and other conservatives could subscribe to my views as well. However, my own experience has been that extreme conservatives have also been opposed to programs that would teach someone how to fish. And where poor folks become too uppity they are the first to use the leverage of the dependency enhancing traditional welfare programs to put those poor folks back in their place. So, do they really oppose traditional welfare programs?

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Aquagirl: The plural of anecdote is not data.
———

Are the thousands of new SSI recipients in the recent, rapid surge in applicant “anecdotes”?

No, they’re moochers being signed up for transfer payments as fast as Obozo can sign them up.

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No md was probably like me and the rest of you that have time to blog. We were lucky enough to start our careers before the cheap labor illegal immigrant wave and trickle down economics got here.

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“Hey md. Why don”t YOU go out there and take one of those entry level jobs and try to live on your pay without any help from anyone. Minimum wage is a joke that isn’t funny.”

Been there done that. Actually had to take THREE of those crappy low paying jobs just to survive. And made the sacrifices to put myself on the forever college plan that took me about 4 times as long as a normal person.

You see, we choose everything we do, including making excuses for why we didn’t do something.

I did it, how about you?

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Well, until four years ago, anyway.

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Perpetual poverty?

“You didn’t build that”…the government did!

Build it and they will come…

until the foundation collapses.

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Lil’ Barry -

Where can I buy that Obamaphone? With the Dow way up since President Obama took office and the general economy trending upward, this Obamaphone should be worth way more than the iPhone!

Now, if only the republicans in the House would get out of the way and stop being obstructionist and let President Obama finish the job!

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“1.Are there enough jobs for everybody to work three of them?”

The Mickey D’s on my road has their help wanted sign up constantly, a revolving door over there. I’ve seen many more just like it. Watch that Jon Stossel report for an eye opener. People standing in line for assistance and just around the corner help wanted signs in the windows.

“2. Why should we have to live like that? ”

It’s called life. Just ask the Greeks, Spaniards, and a host of others how the other method worked for them. If folks want a better job, it’s always up to them to better themselves and go find one vs sitting around waiting for the knock on the door.

“Why don”t we bring manufacturing jobs back to the USA so “common” people can earn a decent living?”

Because those common people have been on a 40 year quest to buy the cheapest thing possible and in doing so have driven down the cost of goods, hence wages as the major component of that cost. Harping about outsourcing will not do a bit of good in today’s global economy. If we continue to buy all the cheap stuff coming in, then we will be stuck with the lower wages, it’s just math.

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“With the Dow way up since President Obama took office and the general economy trending upward”

The dow reflects the financials of individual companies, NOT necessarily the economy. One needs to remember that many of these corps got leaner by cutting jobs, which looks great on an income statement.

As for the economy, 1%+ of growth is not going to get us very far very fast…………

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I love the whole taker vs maker argument.

Its the same old 47 percent stuff that worked for Romney so well.

Keep it up guys.

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So, you’re not racist when you rant about people on the dole when it’s really 3% of the total budget? Maybe if we cut the military…oh wait, you’d never want THAT to happen.

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Comparing the rise in worker productivity and rise in executive compensation, with the stagnation of real wages over the same time period, one could also say that oyr current capitalist system keeps ALOT of people more poor than they should be.

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Reality
Now, if only the republicans in the House would get out of the way and stop being obstructionist and let President Obama finish the job!

Yeah, I guess that depends on what his job is? The 80 B he proposes raising by increasing taxes on the rich, will fund the government for about 5 days, what then? He has proposed no spending cuts. Someone said the other day, that if we eliminated all discretionary spending completely and raised taxes on the rich we would still have a significant yearly deficit. Obama is absent totally on eliminating the deficit and debt, so if that is his job, he hasn’t even addressed it. If his job is screwing over the rich, yeah, the GOP is holding him up. If his job is reducing America to a third world country, he is making progress.

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Only a lib could play the corporate welfare canard and then follow it up by cheering on a Wall Street up to it’s eyeballs in obozobucks.

mindless, freaking mindless

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Lil’ Barry you’re on the right track when you say those that stay in school get jobs. The other side of the coin is that, according to the AJC, 90% of the Georgia prison population is comprised of high school dropouts.

It is no longer possible, with rare exception, to make enough money in this country to raise a family without a minimum of a high school education. That’s why I’d like to see a vasectomy program implemented for potential parolees from Georgia prisons. Many of them will be returning anyway, no need for them to be producing more taxpayer liabilities while they’re out in society.

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As for the economy, 1%+ of growth is not going to get us very far very fast…………
——————————————————————
We should go back to the Bush policies that brought us GDP growth of NEGATIVE 8.9%.

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Where can I buy that Obamaphone?

You already benefit from the “Obamaphone” program. The biggest receiver of funding is the High Cost Program, which equalizes rates for non-urban phone users. It also funds schools and healthcare providers outside populated areas.

They’re about to sink billions into broadband internet equalization, so some of the rugged independent conservative posters here can whine using their government subsidies. And they’ll be totally unaware of the irony as they slam “Obamaphone leeches.”

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Mitch: “We can discuss tax increases, but we demand spending cuts as well”

Dems: “Okay fine, what do you propose we cut”

Mitch: “That’s for me to know and for you to find out”.

[audible whisper to every Republican in the nation] “Don’t worry, we’ll make the Democrats suggest cutting medicare, social security and medicaid so we can then hit them for making these cuts in 2014.”

Dems: “Uh….you know we can hear you, right?”

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md

December 11th, 2012
12:18 pm
“About $59 billion is spent on traditional social welfare programs. $92 billion is spent on corporate subsidies.”

I always get a chuckle with this argument. Considering we are corporations, as in the employees, the managers and the shareholders (401k’s), it is US that is getting those subsidies.

One can pick their poison on those, either take the hit on the front end or take the hit on the back end, but do understand that it is us that is taking the hit.

———————————————————-
I always chuckle with this argument. Considering that we Americans ARE the recipients of social welfare money, money that is then spent immediately at stores we work at or own stock in, at hospitals that serve our communities and/or that we work at, on rental proerties that we own, etc, it is all of us that are getting those subsidies.

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md, if it is just math, why don’t ceos/upper management participate in the math….the workers work harder and get less, the brass may or may not work harder but they get more or a chute.

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Another weak minded argument-

Even though there are way way way more white people on welfare than black.

Blacks are 12% of the population while whites make up about 60 or so percent.

Can’t do math?

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Well, “poverty dependent” makes us say “Oh those lazy people” and that might be true. (I think Kyle said “maybe” also. ) That also leads us to think that THEY are the problem depleting the finances of our country. But, considering the problem that one in every five Americans is dependent on the government, we might get a little different view. One in every five Americans and all of them are not destitute.

As Bill Beach of the Heritage Foundation wrote: “Today, more people than ever before 63.3 million Americans, from college students to retirees to welfare beneficiaries depend on the Federal government for housing, food, income, student aid,or other assistance once considered to be the responsibility of individuals, family neighborhoods, churches, and other civil society institutions.”

So it would seem that the “poor” are not the only ones learning bad habits of dependency.

That is one half of all Americans depending on the government. So let us start the “cure” not only for the poor, but for a whole lot of people. A strong Federal budget and sticking to it would be a good start.

BUDGET? BUDGET? (My kingdom for a budget!) .

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So Dusty, do you want to pay $8 for a gallon of milk if we stop subsidizing milk farmers? Govt dependency does to far beyond the piddling amounts of money we spend in taxes so someone can abuse the welfare system.

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“md, if it is just math, why don’t ceos/upper management participate in the math….the workers work harder and get less, the brass may or may not work harder but they get more or a chute.”

For starters, this is the same as the welfare, we need to be careful to say “some”.

There are good ceo’s and bad one’s, and I have no sympathy for the ones that use a corp as their own personal atm if they did not start the company.

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“Another good joke from md, because reforming fannie and freddie would have prevented the banksters from defrauding the world with credit default swaps and other BS financial swindles.”

If one had a clue, one would understand that F&F bought more mortgages in that time period than they did in their entire history up to that point, so yes, the banksters very well could have been held in check if F&F weren’t backstopping the mortgages………

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“The myth that Fannie and Freddie are responsible”

Part of the problem does not equate to being totally responsible.

But common sense dictates that they wouldn’t currently be in receivership if they were not part of the problem.

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Steve, what you don’t understand is that the milk subsidy limits the amount of milk produced. You can’t just start a dairy and produce milk anymore, you have to get government approval and find a market. Regulations and government control influence how much milk is produced and therefore the price. Get government out of our refrigerators.

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No Steve, I don’t want to pay over eight dollars for a gallon of milk. Nor do I wish to act like a total loon when discussing a problem.

Agricultural subsidies should be considered along with all subsidies and with everything that the Federal Government is spending. Get it? Consider the whole picture, not just a gallon of milk.

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md, cop out on using “some”

ceo compensation has risen 319% (think 1990-2005) and workers 4.5%

what’s good for the goose

http://www.forbes.com/sites/edwardlawler/2012/10/09/outrageous-executive-compensation-corporate-boards-not-the-market-are-to-blame/

nice club that buys off dems and repubs because they have disposable income to influence elections

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clem

Influencing the entire election might be a stretch, ask Adelson and the Koch Brothers as well as Rove with his PAC. Both sides do it, but it doesn’t always produce the results they want.

What I will say is that legislation and regulations can be influenced and is done on local, state and national levels much more than influencing elections. And that “money” will flow in the direction it needs to; right, left and both ways.

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they both…sorry, you lost me on your previous comment directed to me i think.

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clem

was responding to your 1:03 post. Was saying that while the “big money” does work to influence elections, I think they influence legislation and regulation via their money and influence much more than they influence elections. The elections just get more PR, but those same folks, directly or indirectly, are working consistently on a local, state and national level to influence laws and regs.

just my opinion

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The 47% of us who were shamed by Romney, and mocked in that beautiful hotel ballroom, as arrogantly as Antoinette herself could mock, and who now must bear the scars of that bullied slight, so that we may never enter such elite company as the $5000 per plate gathering inferred, are trying to heal. We ask for redstate prayers. I guess Billy Graham was right. There are no atheists when the bus is going over the cliff. (Or in a foxhole during heavy bombardment).

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Dear MarkV

If you want to play in the sandbox of semantics, go right ahead. But you need to tell Bill Beach what to write instead of me.

I do depend on the constitutional guarantees of our government but I do not believe nor do I intend to go beyond those if possible.

Americans departed from a kingdom to become a republic and I don’t want to be a serf or a slave to government. I wish for independence to continue.

Hey, doesn’t that sound nice? .I also know the words to the Battle Hymn of the Republic if you would like to read it. But Christmas shopping calls…..see ya later….

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An interesting site…objective within a variety of topics.

Not right, not left…grounded?

What Happened in Our History Books?

Liberal academia perpetuated bigotry.

While rurality was depicted in a variety of ways in the secondary school history books over time, one perspective remained clear and even gained in force between the years 1956 and 2009: that rural people and ways of life are deficient in comparison to urban and suburban people and ways of life. From this perspective rural people are ignorant and backward and thus in need of education. They are lawless, reckless, and dangerous, thus in need of regulation. And they live in places whose isolation and hardships constrain the development of full human potential.

“History of America”

The 1993 history text shows rural life as dreary and impoverished (without contrasting imagery) and then asks students to describe rural life “in their own words.” Thus, the text presents a negative image of rural life and then provokes students to make that idea “their own.”

In the same vein, the 1993 history text differentiated rural and urban by asserting that rural people adhere to religious fundamentalism — a curious claim, given that by the 1990s Christian fundamentalism, as is well documented, had become a pervasive force nationally.

Based on what I’ve read from liberals here and at other sites, it would appear they’ve fallen victim to to the public school system.

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Yeah, forget the trillions wasted on military and corporate welfare.

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@@:

Super interesting site. Thanks.

Too bad you cherry picked two paragraphs to support your hypothesis “Liberal academia perpetrated bigotry”.

Read the entire essay.

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kristof spend some time with poor white folks in the country but should spend some time with poor minorities in cities to get the whole picture.

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If you actually take the time to determine how much debt was accumulated by each party adjusted for inflation, you would see that it is pretty close to even. By the time Obama leaves office, that won’t be the case.

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Our President Reagan racked up less than $1trillion in debt. Obozo does more than that every year.

When Reagan took office the debt was 1 trillion.

In 8 years he quadrupled it to 4 Trillion.

Obama wont come close to quadrupling our debt.

Try again.

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Meant to say three things.

Yes most days I can count

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Wrong. The key is to have the Internet boom occur on your watch by accident, and pass the dot com bust occur on the next guy’s watch. It’s also helpful to do nothing about Islamofascist terrorism for eight years and let that hot potato go off on your successor too.

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I would like to see a “pundit” write how much corporate and military welfare is needed to keep our economy growing.

How many corporations are making it because of government welfare and how much we can cut without sending our economy back to a recession.

Lets get the total picture and not just focus on the poor.

Another audit of the Pentagon is needed ASAP too.

Lets get real and solve this problem for the last time.

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rafe,

How much did your crybaby speaker propose and what are the cuts he failed to provide?

Lets compare plans rafe.

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rafe,

Are you there or did you cut and run?

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When you quote the weekly standard you dont have a leg to stand on.

Fail

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Barry

Why no mention of the housing and construction boom on Bush’s watch?

You were going to mention it but you feel off your step stool.

No problem, glad I could help you out. Brush yourself off, get up and start wailing and flailing again.

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Funny–Clinton raised taxes on everyone (not just the rich) but the budget didn’t come into supposed “balance” until six years later. And even then, it was only balanced through the looting of the SS trust fund.

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And even then, it was only balanced through the looting of the SS trust fund.

Not in any way factual

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Why no mention of the housing and construction boom on Bush’s watch?
——–

Maybe because we were talking about the Clinton regime.

Please try to keep up.

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Ack! The audacity of a young person who was born into poverty not chomping at the bit to join the military and getting his limbs blown off (or worse) for a war started by Bush/Cheney! How lazy! Don’t they know that government welfare is only for the rich and deserving? Those job creators must come first!

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Please try to keep up.

Keep up

Nobody here even knows what you are talking about.

You are the typical Republican misinformed voter.

You get all of your info inside a small bubble and almost all of it is nowhere near the truth.

Sucks to be you.

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Real Athens:

On second thought……..take your a$$-ump-shuns and stick ‘em!!!!

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Cheesy

It is funny to watch the lonely souls who wail and flail.

Pretty cheap amusement.

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Although it’s not an anti-poverty/social transfer program per se, long-term unemployment insurance is another safety net entitlement that begets dependency.

If you’re near the lower/minimum wage end of the wage scale and you can receive unemployment benefits that exceed minimum wage for up to 99 weeks (and Obama wants to extend that) would you knock yourself out looking for work?

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Real Athens:

Clearly.

If you saw something….BRING IT….otherwise, KMA!

Clear enough for ‘ya?

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Real Athens:

I presented the link with this precursor:

An interesting site…objective within a variety of topics.

Not right, not left…grounded?

Ibid?

Admit it….you are more interested in the attack than you are in acknowledging your mistake….not that I need you to. Following so much resistance on your part, it would prove to be worthless.

Now begone or be stoopid. Matters not to me.

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Sigh:

“After identifying passages in all the texts that made reference to rural people or places, we then summarized our best conjectures of what the authors were trying to convey in each of them. Twelve themes, in our view, captured the underlying messages of these diverse rural references.

• Rural is an Idyll
• Science ,Technology, and Business Improve, but Ultimately Change Agriculture
• Rural People are Political
• The United States Depends on Human Triumph Over Nature
• Rural People and Rural Life are Deficient
• Agriculture is Built on a Legacy of Slavery and Indenture
• Farmers Have Mixed Responses to Central Government
• America Dominates the World
• Geographical Features Influence Settlement Patterns, Land Use, and Ultimately Culture
• The Development of Infrastructure Provided Crucial Links Between Places
• Agriculture Feeds an Industrial Nation
• Rural and Urban Places Diverge”

And what about these themes is unabashedly liberal? I see two that might stick out and be argued by some. Not going there. Greater minds than mine have for 110 years.

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@@:

“schnirt”

Ostentatious chest thumping like the primate he’s not descended from.

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So what, Real Athens….because rural America decreased in numbers (became a minority) they’re no longer relevant? Subject to ridicule?

I disagree! There’s alot to be learned from their history. Text books depicting them as ignorant and backwards serves no useful purpose. At a time when our text books were championing the civil rights movement (rightfully so), they were disparaging rural Americans.

Class warfare perpetuated by democrats and public education….’tis a grand plan.

NOT!

Ostentatious chest thumping like the primate he’s not descended from.

I’m a she, not a he. A believer in ID and evolution. A former liberal who grew to dislike what they’ve become.

surpiiiiiiiiiiise…surpriiiiiiiiise

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Real Athens:

The push to embrace a rural, more agrarian, stewards of sustainable farming, fishing, etc., farm-to-table lifestyle is not being advanced today by modern “conservatives” but by the the folks you revile as liberals.

Sho ’nuff? Read some of the comments offered up by liberals here as they relate to rural America.

Backwards, ignorant, bible-thumping talibaptists, toothless redneck, incestuous hillbillies…the list goes on and on.

Talk to them, not me.

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Really? I’m not familiar with any comments of that sort of this blog.

BS!!!!!

A different day…a different thread…a different name. You’re not to be trusted.

I’m outta here.

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Can you write the same?

On this blog? I can.

I’ve had to use another name at Bookman’s, but only because of his enthusiasm for censorship. I’ve admitted as much and make every attempt to let others know it’s me.

My @@ is verboten over there….from the looks of it, other bloggers can’t mention my name. My “schnirt” has been banned there as well.

Haven’t been there (under any name) in weeks.

No need for alter egos when the one you have is so very HUGE.

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