Republicans disdainful of the unemployed

[ordnance11]

http://www.commondreams.org/video/2010/06/25-1
We're spoiled? A disincentive to go look for work? Do these folks want us to take jobs at McDonalds, WalMart, the local grocery store and live in poverty?
Screw you guys, you're dragging us down paying for you folks. Survival of the fittest (or richest) now rules.
Yesh
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[Epsilon]

Do these folks want us to take jobs at McDonalds, WalMart, the local grocery store and live in poverty?

Yes.
------------------
Epsilon

[Black Aeronaut]

You've just now noticed that Republicans in general feel that the impovershed should remain so?

[robkelk]

It's predestination (one of the few points where Catholic Republicans and Fundamentalist-Protestant Republicans can agree). God wants the poor to be poor, see? If He didn't, He would have made them rich, like He did the Republicans.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

[Foxboy]

That's the big problem with a two-party system. It tends to polarize political discourse.

IOW, Dems are painted by Republicans as SPEND SPEND SPEND Granola People! And Republicans are painted by Dems as Reactionary asshats!

If a DECENT Middle-of-the-road party came about...

... >< They'd be painted as wishy-washy fence-sitters.

It's a shame too. I'd LIKE to see a "The most good for the most people, in the most cost-effective way possible." political platform that was taken seriously.
''We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat
them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.''

-- James Nicoll

[ECSNorway]

The problem with that, Fox, is that people have very different definitions of what's good for people.

For example, foreign aid to third-world countries. Some people think it's good of us to send them so much money and goods. Some people think we're just propping up their dictators and keeping them from actually developing a real economy.
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Valles]

If one accepts the premise that hard work and moral rectitude inevitably overcome any, or even most degrees of innately disadvantaged starting positions, then systematic assistance to the poor or the out of work becomes unnecessary, and, for those who confuse their own bottom line with the country's, even evil.

Unfortunately, this line of reasoning rests on a premise which is demonstrably untrue, and produces behavior I have to work very hard to characterize as anything but monstrously selfish.
===========

===============================================
"V, did you do something foolish?"
"Yes, and it was glorious."

[Ayiekie]

The vast majority of people in the first world consider Republicans to be reactionary, so, uh, that really doesn't have anything to do with a polarisation of discourse caused by a two-party system. Plus, the party platform contains many elements that are literally reactionary by the dictionary definition of the term.

The Democratic party IS middle-of-the-road. It is a centre-right, corporate-friendly party that constantly hews to the centre of the political spectrum and marginalises its members that could be considered in any way left-wing. What the United States does not possess is any actual left-wing party, which tends to skew perceptions and political discourse in people only familiar with American politics. However, you're quite correct in that the Democrats are frequently painted (by actual left-wingers as well as right-wingers) as wishy-washy fence-sitters.

Also, every party's political platform is "The most good for the most people, in the most cost-effective way possible", and for the most part, the people in every party believe that's what they're doing. I mean, really, what do you think they think they're doing?

[Epsilon]

The baseline Republican premise comes from the fact that the baseline Republican lives in a position of vast, almost overwhelming, privelege which is invisible to him. The very act of being a white able-bodied heterosexual cissexual middle class western male contains overwhelming amounts of privelege compared to anyone else in the world. The fact that these people assume that everyone benefits from the same advantages that are invisible to them is almost criminal.
----------------
Epsilon

[Logan Darklighter]

The very fact that you people can get things so consistently, blatantly wrong over and over again astounds me. The blithering stupidity displayed here literally hurts my brain. 

[Ayiekie]

Not, of course, that it will cause you to explain exactly what is wrong and enlighten us poor souls with your nigh-superhuman grasp of political thought.

[Logan Darklighter]

Ayiekie, I've laid out reasons and logic before. I spent DAYS researching a topic making sure I got my facts straight before posting and what did it get me? 

I give you facts, you disparage the source. I lay out reasoning, you put up straw man after straw man. 

I'm bloody tired. I'm just tired of fighting you. It's like ramming my head into a brick wall over and over and it's about as fun. I might continue if I might be offered even just a little bit of respect. To acknowledge that I -have- thought things through and simply come to a different conclusion and that there might possibly be a point of view different from yours that was arrived at logically. But your smugness and condescension seems to be endless. 

You seem to live in a world of complete 180 degrees of logic. You make me wonder sometimes if you're posting from some parallel universe. 

Look. Are you REALLY interested in any viewpoint other than your own? Or are you just baiting me? Because I'm loathe to drag myself into this fight again for no gain whatsoever. I shouldn't even have posted in this thread really. I'm really about to just give this whole sub-forum a wash and never open it again. 

[Ayiekie]

Dude, your post led off with how you think that the Muslim religion (as if there's just one) and culture (as if there's just one) are inherently worthless and inferior (as if that's even a meaningful comment when talking about cultures) to the west and that one or the other must be destroyed. Sure, I dismissed it out of hand beyond an offhand comment about a followup post that showed blatant ignorance of the factual history of Jewish relations with Muslim and Christian countries, for the exact same reason I would dismiss a similarly long and "researched" post about the inferiority of Hindus or Africans (and don't think the latter hasn't been done).

I could have rebut it point for point, but why bother? The very fact you think there is such a thing as a monolithic Muslim culture, or that being a Muslim means anything about how an individual or an entire country will or should act (and don't say you don't, when you literally, quote, said "no true coexistence is possible"), means we are utterly not on the same wavelength. Aside from the fact I consider it a horribly bigoted opinion to hold, my viewpoint is that you can explain why any given country/ethnic group is the way it is by looking at the factors that shape it, which in the Middle East's case only very, very tangentially has to do with it being predominantly Muslim (with several large minorities that aren't, like the ruling class of Maronite Christians in Lebanon, the Copts in Egypt, and so on).

Being Muslim means nothing, and there's nothing you'll ever say that will convince me otherwise. There is literally nothing a Muslim-ruled society invariably is. Muslim ruled societies have openly drank alcohol, been pacifistic, supported women's rights, been progressive, and been secular. Doesn't it seem far more likely, even to you, that the real reason the Middle East is relatively culturally backward and hostile to the West is because of actual political events rather than anything inherent in the religion?

And bluntly, don't use the word "fact" to describe crap posted from openly biased sources. If what you're posting is actually true you should be able to find it in sources that at least pay lip service to neutrality. If you can only find your facts on hard-right-wing sites, than you should consider giving those facts the same credence you would if I posted "facts" sourced only from MoveOn.org. Putting the fact that you consider the mainstream media to be left-wing-biased (and I consider it, in the US at least, to be very much the opposite) aside, there is still a difference between a biased source that attempts to be neutral and a source that is openly shilling for one side.

And of course I'm interested in viewpoints other than my own, or I wouldn't post on a message board. Honestly, Logan, the reason I don't show your viewpoints a lot of respect is two-fold:

1) You (and ECSNorway, and please forgive me if I occasionally conflate you since you often post essentially the same opinions and my memory is not perfect) do not give the same respect to others. My rather mild comments on the Somali pirates being as much victims as victimisers, for instance, got me told I was the worst person ever, or something to that effect. My posts have frequently been met with derision and insults regardless of the politeness of my tone. If that's actually just ECS and you have never done anything like that (but I'm pretty sure you both have), then I apologise. As well, you openly gloat when Democrats such as Obama do not live up to the ideals of their supporters, which is kind of rude.
(Edit: a quick browse over the forum shows that you have in fact responded to civil posts of mine with insults as far back as 2006, so I now feel pretty comfortable with this description of you, as well as old.)

2) Bluntly, you hold extremely across-the-board straight talking point US right-wing opinions. You don't like Muslims, think global warming is a hoax dreamed up by those sneaky scientists, oppose affirmative action, decry "political correctness", you honestly believe the Democratic party of the US promotes left-wing policies, you think Californians are wacky and Texans sensible, love your guns, you believe in US exceptionalism, you unconditionally support Israel, and so on and so forth. It is hard for me to believe you think through your opinions, even aside from your predilection to posting links to "facts" from right-wing conspiracy sites, when your position on any topic conforms so absolutely to your party's line. Though, I'll give you credit and note you aren't actually a Creationist, at least (but neither are most classic pro-business Republicans; it's an import from the religious right).

I don't hold across-the-board "correct" left-wing views (I support certain uses of the military and a reasonable amount of spending, I support sustainable hunting of any wild animal population including whales and cute baby seals, I think laws passed to protect people from themselves are usually harmful, I don't think much of organic farming, and so on and so forth) and consider people that do to be cartoons who don't think for themselves and instead are doing the political equivalent of cheering for their favourite sports team. And you and ECS seem much the same way. I'm sorry about that; I really am, because I think it's unfortunate you feel so frustrated. But I'm not going to lie to you - and I think it's far more unfortunate that I don't really see in your positions any evidence that you've thought them through very carefully and kept an open mind. I don't know you and of course I could be wrong - and of course, you think I am, and I rather doubt anything I say will change that.

But come on, man. The Democrats as a hard left-wing party? Let's be fucking serious here. The very fact there is a left wing within the Democrats railing against how the laws the party passes aren't very left-wing should be sufficient to prove that, even if you never compare the Democratic platform to the platform of any other left-wing party in the world.

[robkelk]

Y'know, I was going to reply to this with links to the platforms of the three major political parties in Canada - one right-wing, one centrist, one left-wing - so that folks in the USA could see what real left-wing and right-wing positions look like. However, two of those three parties don't appear to post their platform documents to their official websites. I've emailed both, asking for the URLs, but this is the weekend...

In the meantime, here's http://www.conservative.ca/media/2008-P ... tion-e.pdf]the right-wing party's platform document. I'll edit this post when (or if) the other two get back to me.

Edit: They've gotten back to me.

The centrist party:

On behalf of the Liberal Party of Canada, I would like to acknowledge receipt of your recent email requesting policy information.

The Liberal Party is currently undergoing a process of policy renewal. This started with our highly successful Canada at 150 conference recently held in Montreal. There Mr. Ignatieff announced that a Liberal Government would freeze corporate tax rates - instead of cutting them as the Harper Government is planning – until such time as we can afford them.

Mr. Ignatieff has also made policy announcements regarding rural Canada, (%[link=http://www.liberal.ca/ruralcanadamatters]www.liberal.ca/ruralcanadamatters]), the fire arms registry (%[link=http://www.liberal.ca/publicsafety]www.liberal.ca/publicsafety]) and on Canada's Place in the World (%[link=http://www.lpc.ca/canworld]www.lpc.ca/canworld]).

You can visit the Liberal Party’s website (%[link=http://www.liberal.ca]www.liberal.ca]) or the Canada at 150 website (%[link=http://www.can150.ca]www.can150.ca]) for all the latest policy announcements as they become available.

Thank you for taking the time to write.

And the left-wing party:

The NDP produces a Platform document once there is a chance of an election since the issues important to Canadians' change frequently based on current events. I have attached the last platform for you (often some of the items do carry forward to the next election) but to know what the NDP is currently working on the best place to look is our website %[link=http://www.ndp.ca]www.ndp.ca]. The issue notes and press release sections often reflect current work done by the NDP.

(That's as-received; I didn't introduce the grammatical error.)

If anybody wants a copy of the left-wing party's last platform document, email me (robkelk atsign gmail period com) and I'll send it along. One might be surprised at what a real left-wing party stands for, especially if one thinks the US Democrats are left-wing...
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

[Jinx999]

Can you all take a deep breath and relax a bit?
First, America is a very diverse country with a wide range of people . . . . and only two political parties worth mentioning. These parties are both incredibly broad tents that contain factions that have ABSOLUTELY NOTHING in common and are only part of the same party by historical accident.
Both parties contain a) 45% of the American population and b) some lunatics. And both contain people who like pointing at the lunatics of the other party and saying "vote for us or they'll get in". And a lot of people seem to fall for this. Including the people here who start talking about The Other Party(tm) as if it's a coherent group and saying that they're all X.

[Epsilon]

The problem with your theory, Jinx, is that the GOP is being run by the crazies.
For instance, let's look at the Idaho GOP for a second. This isn't just a move to make a MtF unable to marry another female. This is a ove to prevent all transgendered human beings from being able to marry, ever. Or how about the Texas GOP which wants to bring back sodomy laws. (and that's onyl the tip fo the iceberg for the Texas GOP crazy). And how about the Maine GOP whose platform includes anti-gay hysteria, Creationist pandering, global warming denialism and, of course, the complete elimination of the Department of Education.
I'm sorry guys, but the GOP is fucking insane.
-----------------
Epsilon

[Bob Schroeck]

Including the people here who start talking about The Other Party(tm) as if it's a coherent group and saying that they're all X.

That's right! The Shiite/Sunni split alone puts the lie to the idea of the single monolithic Republican... oh, wait. Lost track of what thread I'm in there for a moment.

More on topic, during a rather extended websurf I did last night I ran across an interesting observation -- one that, due to the generalized application of Poe's Law I cannot determine is either serious or a well-done parody. It went along the lines of "Of course we [the Republicans] want an impoverished American underclass -- after we get immigration reform through and deport all the Mexicans, we're going to need a new source of cheap labor for gardening and housekeeping."
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[ordnance11]

There is this guy who I'm in frequent contact over at the VA. A fellow job-seeker like me, ex-Navy officer. I met him at the parking lot and we were discussing this bit of news. He said it would be better if we get rid of the entire lot in the senate. My rejoinder is that it'd be better if we just got rid of all the Republicans. Boy, he didn't like that. He snarled that the country is going into to the poorhouse because of all the money the country have been spending. My rejoinder is that would he rather see a re-run of the Great Depression. It got headed before we decided to break from it.
__________________
Into terror!,  Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell

[Ayiekie]

I'll bet he was JUST as upset when the Bush administration was spending hundreds of billions of dollars blowing up Iraqis, just like everyone else. It's amazing how much money can be found to blow up brown people, and how little can be found for things like education, health care, or infrastructure.

Fun fact: Under the Bush administration, for the first time the US defence budget expanded to the point where it roughly equal to the defence budgets of the entire rest of the world (it's now "only" 43% or so of the world total; they could cut 2/3 of it and still be spending over twice as much as China, the world's #2 military spender). In 2003, the total was just shy of a trillion dollars, or about the entire current GDP of Australia (ranked 13-14th of countries in the world by GDP, depending on who you ask) and 2/3 - 9/10 as much as Russia or India's entire GDP (again, depending on who you ask). By some estimates it is expected the budget will actually pass a trillion dollars in fiscal year 2010.

Fun fact #2: The figures above are only based on officially reported military expenditures authorised through Congress, which is decidedly less than the actual cost of, say, the war in Iraq. In fact, the operations of Iraq and Afghanistan were not even counted in those figures prior to this year, as they were funded in supplementary bills and not the Federal Budget. So you can add the entire cost of both wars and subsequent occupations on top of this. The "official" figures on the cost of those wars (which does not include Pentagon "black box" operations, whose funding are not reported, nor many things such as the hiring of mercenaries groups like Blackwater) is $900,000,000,000 as of 2008. These figures also do not include the cost of medical treatment for wounded soldiers, nor the interest on the additional debt added to the United States budget.

Fun fact #3: The Obama administration has ramped up military spending since taking office.

[Black Aeronaut]

Obama would be a pariah if he didn't ramp up military spending. Because of the die cast by the Bush Administration it's very dificult to extricate ourselves from the situation we're in without looking like even worse assholes than we are now.

Now we are investing in other countries. Hopefully the return will be stable democratic states that would like to trade peacefully with their neighbors instead of train people to blow themselves up and take down as many 'unclean ones' with them as possible.

Can you really put a price on that?

Debatable. Very much so.

Also, I do like the direction that the Navy is trying to go with new ships. Especially the Litoral Combat Ships. Slightly smaller than Destroyers, and built from the keel up to be more efficient in all aspects from fuel consumption to manning. What makes them really nifty is the modular mission packs. Swap packs and it's a land-attack platform. Swwap 'em again and it's an ECM Ship! Swap again and it's a Pirate Hunter!

It's a welcome change from the seemingly dedicated focus on aircraft carriers - not that they aren't useful! I just feel that the USN shouldn't be entirely centered around that one aspect.

Let's face it: no matter what we are going to be spending more and more money with the passage of time. And I would rather have the Government spend money than try to save it. Because you know what? When the Government spends money, Americans somewhere make money. At least that's how it ideally works. There's a need for reform to make sure that money isn't being spent on people that don't need it. A certain issue with farming grants comes to mind...

[Ayiekie]

Uh, I look askance on the supposed necessity to subsidise the hell out of FarmerClemCorp every time it comes whining to the government with straw cap in hand as much as the next guy, but did you actually just argue that spending a trillion dollars on making things to blow up Iraqis was a sensible investment in comparison to wasteful, unnecessary farm grants?

[Black Aeronaut]

Ayiekie wrote:

---

Uh, I look askance on the supposed necessity to subsidise the hell out of FarmerClemCorp every time it comes whining to the government with straw cap in hand as much as the next guy, but did you actually just argue that spending a trillion dollars on making things to blow up Iraqis was a sensible investment in comparison to wasteful, unnecessary farm grants?

Not like you are.  The issue is that Bush got us into this mess and now we gotta dig ourselves out.  And yes, that means making guns, bullets, and bombs to kill people that would very much like to kill us just because someone told them their holy book said so.  It also means building schools, hospitals, roads, powerlines, bridges, and pipelines to help them get back on their feet again.  That shit gets expensive, especially when you gotta start all over again from scratch.  (The Taliban - bringing life back to the Bronze Age so you can effectively rule with your AK-47s!)
Though really, if you want to know who I think should be getting just as much money, it should be teachers, police, and emergency services people.  But you know how that goes.  Far easier to bitch about false-fronts claiming farming grants and other similar shit.  Trust me, there's even a book on this.
Hell, even Military spending... good lord, who the hell gets this money?  A valve block for my ship's automated gun costs as much as a house, and that's after the defective unit is returned!  (Parts for the Vertical Launch Sytem are even worse.  "Ah, that little bolt costs about fifty dollars.  That special wrench that will only fit that bolt costs about five-hundred.")  I don't know who the real villain is: the contractors for browbeating senators into letting them get away with this kind of price gouging or the Senators for allowing that to happen!
There's a lot of wasteful spending going on.  The real problem is that the beauracractic jungle is so thick that you'd never get to fix them all.  Every time you reform something, another something goes crooked.  (-.-
EDIT: BTW, this is how terrorism ought to be fought... cost effective and economical as you please.  Too bad the UN would freak out over it.

    

[Epsilon]

blackaeronaut wrote:
EDIT: BTW, this is how terrorism ought to be fought... cost effective and economical as you please.  Too bad the UN would freak out over it.
    

Did you... did you just endorse mass fucking murder?
O_O
---------------
Epsilon

[Black Aeronaut]

Sorry, I guess I did. But you know what the hell of it is? Islamic extremists think of mass murder as the will of God. Pershing just wanted them to quit killing his soldiers and the locals unfortunate enough to be caught in the crossfire. And at a head-count of forty-nine enemy soldiers, I'd say he made a wise choice.

Was it morally questionable? Sure, especially the way he used their own religeon against them (I would have thought that you guys would have pounced on me for that instead of mass murder).

But how questionable is it when you compare that to the other, far more hideous acts that have been perpatrated in the history of the world? When in this modern day men such as the ones Pershing ordered killed would throw acid on girls because they want to go to school or mutilate their genitals so other men wouldn't want to bed them?

I look at the statistics today and shake my head. How many have died in Iraq so far? A lot more than forty-nine. And that's not just soldiers (ours, theirs, don't matter). It's the civilians, too, that can't get the heck out of the way of an exploding car-bomb. To me that's a far more heinous sin than killing forty-nine men who themselves were killers.

Don't argue the point with me. The world is not black and white, and I'm sure as hell am not anywhere close to the whiter side of the scale. Don't get me wrong, I let small stuff slide. Hurt someone I love, though, and you'd better dig your own grave.

I apologize if this offends anyone, but... *shruggs* There you have it.

[robkelk]

Did you... did you just endorse mass fucking murder?
O_O
---------------
Epsilon

Looks like... and the justification he gave for it http://www.snopes.com/rumors/pershing.asp]probably never happened.
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012