The Evils of Socialism Explained

[Rob's House]

You fascinate me. The quality of writing demonstrates heightened intelligence, yet the substance is contrived beyond belief.

Let's do this...

 

1. For one thing, "handout," implies something being "given away." What can you demonstrate quantitatively that supports this? Federal welfare dollars is a function of aggregated taxpayer subsidy. The taxpayer subsidy is comprised of deductions from working folks' gross income. Gross income is achieved by folks working a job.

 

Therefore, working folks pay into a system that they may need to draw from at a later date. If people have paid into something, and then receive benefit or a dividend from that aggregate pool which they paid into consistent with pre-established criteria that everyone was aware of at the outset of the arrangement, can there, by definition, be a handout?

 

...

 

And absent your ability to provide that data, how do you differentiate between welfare payout and automobile insurance payout?

 

And if we assume that they have worked AT SOME POINT, and consequently paid taxes, what's wrong with them realizing the value of their investment?

 

...

 

So again I ask, absent your ability to provide that data, how do you differentiate between welfare payout and automobile insurance payout? You can't.

 

If you were talking about unemployment insurance you might have a point here. You're not so you don't. There are entire subcultures that live off of welfare for generations. And usually if you qualify for one form you qualify for it all. It becomes a hammock by which you have entire neighborhoods filled with people who don't pay rent, have no job, but get a check every month. It's not a case of someone paying into a risk pool and then reaping the benefit when bad luck befalls him.

 

As far as your parallel to auto insurance, which is absurd res ipsa loquitor, you've conveniently omitted the most fundamental distinction between the two which is that insurance is voluntary. And don't give me the bit about mandatory auto insurance (it's beneath both of us) because you don't have to drive and if you do you can choose which insurance company and plan to go with. No such choice on government welfare programs.

 

2. But let's just assume that I didn't mention anything above. I can approach this from a different direction:

 

You said: "there is a fundamental difference between borrowing money you're going to pay back with interest, and getting a handout."

 

Really?

 

Is there really that big a difference between welfare and student loans (with respect to your bolded point above)?

 

Student loan default rate is at almost 9% and rising (http://www.ed.gov/news/press-releases/default-rates-rise-federal-student-loans). That doesn't into account folks who have deferred their loan payments indefinitely due to financial hardship. Do you think that William D. Ford will ever see the entirety of that $________ loan that he so graciously lent?

 

Answer: No. And not only is that common knowledge, but even the FEDERAL GOVERNMENT knows it and even codifed the **** with the Income Based Repayment option: http://studentaid.ed.gov/PORTALSWebApp/students/english/IBRPlan.jsp

 

Pay for 25 years, the rest of you shizit is cancelled.

 

So really now....is there really an appreciable difference, other than in principle?

Already explained and you chose to ignore the explanation because if !@#$s up your argument. Your example best illustrates the dangers of letting government control various industries. Just as they took control of medicare and used it as leverage to justify further intrusion into private life (i.e. govt can tax the **** out of cigarettes, alcohol, certain foods, etc. because when you get old and sick your healthcare bills come out of my tax $$$), the feds inserted themselves into the student loan market making supply of funding for secondary education artificially high, thus jacking up tuition (not totally dissimilar from how relaxed home lending standards increased the supply of funds available for housing thus causing the price of housing to skyrocket).

 

So now if you want student loans, the private market that would otherwise exist does not exist, and the moron who wants to go to a private school to get a degree in women's studies is on equal footing with someone pursuing a quantitative degree to further a clear set career path with a high likelihood of ROI.

 

In a sane world a lender would look at your track record, projected career path, and likelihood of return on investment. Enter the government and the rest is history. So anyone who wants to pursue secondary education who doesn't have cash on hand is all but forced to deal with the feds AND has to pay higher tuition because of the perverse system the govt has created.

 

3. Fu_k it, I'll approach this a third way. I can even make the case that there isn't an "in principle" difference. Many of the public welfare programs have an accompanying "look-for-work" provision. There are time limits in many states as an attendant check. Cash assistance in many states require "pay back in full." Section 8 in many states requires actively maintaining a job and limits on occupants (effectively paying back the subsidizing agent). Food stamps, in many states, have time limits (though admittedly very few states enforce this).

 

So when you consider the situation functionally and principally, is there really that huge of a chasm between Federal Student Loans and "traditional" welfare (incidentally, Student Loans is a "welfare" program)?

Here again you're making the argument for temporary unemployment insurance but using it to justify something that is so far removed from what you're actually defending. It would be like me stating that recreational use of heroin should be allowed and supporting it by presenting the arguments for pot. Only yours is even worse than that because at least then we'd be dealing with the same basic questions of drawing the line between personal liberty and public health and safety. Your argument is more akin to claiming recreational heroin use should be allowed and supporting it by arguing the value of anesthesia for invasive operations.

 

Additionally, the "look for work" provisions are great if you're looking at the situation through den mother tinted glasses. However, in reality, there is virtually no way to enforce these. You put in a few resumes and you meet your requirement. I know plenty of people bleeding that system right now.

 

 

1. How are government welfare programs "flawed by their very nature"?

If history has taught us anything it is that government is inherrently inefficient. There are many essential functions for which government is necessary (see article 1 sec 8). An argument can be made that some social welfare provided for by government is desirable. That does not negate the fact that government is poorly equipped for efficient implementation of such a thing, it just means that in some situations (and reasonable men will differ as to where this line should be drawn) the end outweighs the expense.

 

3. Absolutist government power - yes. It has to do with a cyclical political ecosystem that, while profoundly "slippery-slopish," seems to bear fruit.

 

And that cyclical arrangement is the reason that on the farthest right, there are also hints of the farthest left (e.g., "purist libertarians" from a political alignment standpoint tend to lean republican, however they also typically advocate no government incursion into social items like choice, expression, marriage [traditionally considered democratic tenants]).

 

Throughout history there are regimes, countries, nations that have evolved thusly:

 

The government begins to legislate, tax, enforce, items that are not accepted by vox populi. As a result a burgeoning sentiment of government push-back develops. That sentiment is sometimes codified and becomes a political entity or it percolates amongst the citizenry.

 

The government either scales back through representative government, or it develops a stronger presence to monitor and quell opposition and revolt. In the latter instance, the percolating sentiment bubbles over (in time) predicating an transformational political shift, usually towards a less centralized presence - in response to the characteristics of the previous regime in its latter stages of existence.

 

The more localized government is cool for a while....until Canadians stage mini-sieges on the northern border and people can't trust that there food from England isn't being delivered replete with e-coli.

 

A plan for a centralized government forms to handle these eventualities, the coordination of territories, logistics, and the growing presence of factions (Let's go James Madison). That government grows, adafts, shifts, changes with the international realties and cultural viccissitudes. It becomes the monster that it was aimed at defeating.

 

So then.... this new government begins to legislate, tax, enforce, items that are not accepted by vox populi. As a result a burgeoning sentiment of government push-back develops. That sentiment is sometimes codified and becomes a political entity or it percolates amongst the citizenry.....

 

Need proof - look at this country from England to now. We're in the circle.

 

The removal of fundamental public welfare programs will just expedite the cycle. I'll acknowledge that what I'm saying exists in the realm of the theoretical....but only because it hasn't happened in this country. If you, however, replace " federal government" with "monarchy," or with "dictatorship," you'll see that analagous historical instances exist.

I don't really take issue with your description of the cycle, nor am I pushing for a return to the Articles of Confederation. I just don't follow you so far as to assume that the absence of our various forms of public welfare as they currently exist would lead us down that path.

 

1. The "you guys" comment is still bothersome. It's seems dismissive and stereotypical, but it's cool.

You guys are really sensitive.

 

2. I addressed the "audacity to work" thing above. Provide the metrics, then we'll talk. Otherwise, people, at one point or another, paid into something. There was a "meeting of the minds." There arrangement was bilateral. Their only "audacity," is the audacity to expect that that system will be solvent enough to provide recompense.

 

3. Debt, yes. Solvency, a problem. So, what's your solution? Let me guess: "just cut the cord," right? Short, sweet, profoundly naive and decidedly ineffective.

 

Gotcha.

As to #2, we're back to the unemployment insurance model, unless you're arguing the case of social security, which is a ponzi scheme and is unsustainable as it is but can't be modified because of its "third rail" status. In the mean-time it's an anchor around our proverbial necks and its dragging us under. (Not just ss, but that, medicare, govt pensions, etc.)

As far as how to solve the problem, cutting the cord is obviously not an option, which is one of the reasons we should be damn careful before haphazzardly introducing new sweeping government entitlements like the Bush Medicare bill and Obamacare, especially when the country's going bankrupt. Because people become reliant on the systems that are put in place and they fundamentally change the landscape such that you can't just pull the plug and go back to how it was before, because the previous institutions no longer exist as they did prior to the government intervention BECAUSE of said intervention. But a gradual weening off the government tit might be the only way to avert imminent economic destruction.

 

That's an uphill battle because morons like DIN are numerous and they can't get their narrow minds around the outrage of someone not getting the best medical treatment money can buy to see the plain and simple truth that there is nothing noble or compassionate about pledging resources you don't have, regardless of how good that cause may look on paper. Nor can they bring themselves to accept the fact that government funded retirement and health care isn't going to be worth **** if the economy collapses.

[3rdnlng]

You fascinate me. The quality of writing demonstrates heightened intelligence, yet the substance is contrived beyond belief.

 

If you were talking about unemployment insurance you might have a point here. You're not so you don't. There are entire subcultures that live off of welfare for generations. And usually if you qualify for one form you qualify for it all. It becomes a hammock by which you have entire neighborhoods filled with people who don't pay rent, have no job, but get a check every month. It's not a case of someone paying into a risk pool and then reaping the benefit when bad luck befalls him.

 

As far as your parallel to auto insurance, which is absurd res ipsa loquitor, you've conveniently omitted the most fundamental distinction between the two which is that insurance is voluntary. And don't give me the bit about mandatory auto insurance (it's beneath both of us) because you don't have to drive and if you do you can choose which insurance company and plan to go with. No such choice on government welfare programs.

 

 

Already explained and you chose to ignore the explanation because if !@#$s up your argument. Your example best illustrates the dangers of letting government control various industries. Just as they took control of medicare and used it as leverage to justify further intrusion into private life (i.e. govt can tax the **** out of cigarettes, alcohol, certain foods, etc. because when you get old and sick your healthcare bills come out of my tax $$$), the feds inserted themselves into the student loan market making supply of funding for secondary education artificially high, thus jacking up tuition (not totally dissimilar from how relaxed home lending standards increased the supply of funds available for housing thus causing the price of housing to skyrocket).

 

So now if you want student loans, the private market that would otherwise exist does not exist, and the moron who wants to go to a private school to get a degree in women's studies is on equal footing with someone pursuing a quantitative degree to further a clear set career path with a high likelihood of ROI.

 

In a sane world a lender would look at your track record, projected career path, and likelihood of return on investment. Enter the government and the rest is history. So anyone who wants to pursue secondary education who doesn't have cash on hand is all but forced to deal with the feds AND has to pay higher tuition because of the perverse system the govt has created.

 

 

Here again you're making the argument for temporary unemployment insurance but using it to justify something that is so far removed from what you're actually defending. It would be like me stating that recreational use of heroin should be allowed and supporting it by presenting the arguments for pot. Only yours is even worse than that because at least then we'd be dealing with the same basic questions of drawing the line between personal liberty and public health and safety. Your argument is more akin to claiming recreational heroin use should be allowed and supporting it by arguing the value of anesthesia for invasive operations.

 

Additionally, the "look for work" provisions are great if you're looking at the situation through den mother tinted glasses. However, in reality, there is virtually no way to enforce these. You put in a few resumes and you meet your requirement. I know plenty of people bleeding that system right now.

 

 

 

If history has taught us anything it is that government is inherrently inefficient. There are many essential functions for which government is necessary (see article 1 sec 8). An argument can be made that some social welfare provided for by government is desirable. That does not negate the fact that government is poorly equipped for efficient implementation of such a thing, it just means that in some situations (and reasonable men will differ as to where this line should be drawn) the end outweighs the expense.

 

 

I don't really take issue with your description of the cycle, nor am I pushing for a return to the Articles of Confederation. I just don't follow you so far as to assume that the absence of our various forms of public welfare as they currently exist would lead us down that path.

 

 

You guys are really sensitive.

 

 

As to #2, we're back to the unemployment insurance model, unless you're arguing the case of social security, which is a ponzi scheme and is unsustainable as it is but can't be modified because of its "third rail" status. In the mean-time it's an anchor around our proverbial necks and its dragging us under. (Not just ss, but that, medicare, govt pensions, etc.)

As far as how to solve the problem, cutting the cord is obviously not an option, which is one of the reasons we should be damn careful before haphazzardly introducing new sweeping government entitlements like the Bush Medicare bill a :thumbsup:nd Obamacare, especially when the country's going bankrupt. Because people become reliant on the systems that are put in place and they fundamentally change the landscape such that you can't just pull the plug and go back to how it was before, because the previous institutions no longer exist as they did prior to the government intervention BECAUSE of said intervention. But a gradual weening off the government tit might be the only way to avert imminent economic destruction.

 

That's an uphill battle because morons like DIN are numerous and they can't get their narrow minds around the outrage of someone not getting the best medical treatment money can buy to see the plain and simple truth that there is nothing noble or compassionate about pledging resources you don't have, regardless of how good that cause may look on paper. Nor can they bring themselves to accept the fact that government funded retirement and health care isn't going to be worth **** if the economy collapses.

 

 

Post of the year!

[Magox]

I'll acknowledge your economic argument and raise a sociological one: if you don't provide nary a social welfare program to the 28,000,000 million abjectly impoverished in this country (on the books), there will be public looting, disarray, and vigilantism.

 

Charitable organizations are stretched thin NOW with billions annually in federal dollars going to public welfare programs. What are they gonna do when the fed money FULL STOPS?

 

Sure, some will get jobs. But then how about the fundamentally unskilled, the developmentally challenged, the mentally ill, the handicapped, the profoundly un-motivated? Will they just not eat? Are they gonna just recede into society politely after they've been told that they, and no one else, have to rejoin the conceptual "state of nature"?

 

No, it will result in mobocracy and lawlessness and bedlam the extent of which can only be conjectured.

 

You think that there are enough state law enforcement resources to handle 25 million desperate, hungry, debased people?

 

Enter vigilantism. Vigilantism begets martial law. Martial law maintains stability while the corresponding governmental institutionalized action (over-reach) - to ensure that such mobocracy forever remains in check - is conceived, developed and implemented.

 

In effect, you create the monster that you aimed to destroy.

 

Again, some folks are gonna get there hair did on your dollar. Suck it up and read some Thomas Hobbes.

 

Given the sociological realities, subsidizing public welfare programs is better than the alternative.

I agree, there definitely has to exist effective social safety nets. I suppose the problem is that we don´t want to create an entitlement society that is dependent of some of these programs, more so for the able working people. There has to be more reforms in our Social safety net programs.

[Magox]

Listen you stupid !@#$, I gave you two examples of his socialistic tendencies. If you can't hang, don't make the attempt.

dude, relax

[Magox]

 

 

(that is, after they take their cut)

Which isn´t nearly as much as all the lemmings of this world believe.

[Juror#8]

After reading through the rest of this thread, I suppose I don't really need to respond to any of this, now do I? But, what the hell, I will anyway.

 

See, some of us work in the corporate world, and therefore, our work can actually interfere with our posting, as is the case here. Please don't misunderstand, I would have loved to continue this. If you had told me you were going to predicate posts on your nitwit understanding of health care, insurance in general, risk, risk mitigation, and how these things are managed properly....and try to use that as justification for why we need to continue welfare as designed ...well, nah, I probably still didn't have the time, but I would have tried a lot harder.

 

There ya go again...I never used "healthcare, insurance..." et cetera, as "justification" for why we need to continue healthcare. My justification was simple and can be found on the initial pages of this thread. In brief, the "justifications" were humanity and in an effort to avert a sociological catastrophe.

 

What you mis-characterized as "justification" (because of your edit, and your demonstrated discourteousness towards nouns, participles, and edit) was simply an analogy so that insert interlocutor here would be forced to techincally distinguish between an accepted practice and a disparaged policy.

 

If I had have used "healthcare, insurance....blah, blah..." as a justification, it would have been presently thusly:

 

"Welfare is necessary because insurance follows the same formula."

 

That was never my argument. I never said that/mentioned that in that construction. So there you go conflating one thing for another in an effort to appear to add something meaningful to the discussion.

 

Of course you didn't, per usual. Edit - [but I'll retain] - drunkard in an early Irish novel (quick, catch the reference).

 

You're wrong, per usual.

 

A forgotten fact here is that in the post where I analogized welfare and private insurance, that was but a small piece of a MUCH LARGER POST. Everything else that I mentioned there was ignored, and the most controvertial component highlighted, as if that analogy was somehow thematic of the entire thought.

 

It wasn't. It doesn't encapsulate my thoughts on the matter and you would do well to read that entire post (if you haven't already) instead of debating truncated versions.

 

I believe that you generally engage these types of endeavors in a more perfunctory way, but I thought I'd at least ask.

 

Unfortunately, you've demonstrated nothing that says that you can debate cogently for any appreciable amount of time.

 

You're kind of like fireworks, a semi-brilliant display, but forgotten by morning.

 

I think that I'm going to turn my attention to those who can debate a position honestly, and without all the histrionics. I've pounded you Castrato, in thread after thread. In some cases you just let the thread fade into oblivion because I've dismantled you - the entirety of you - so categorically (see the "Mitt is a..." thread and the "Roosevelt" thread).

 

I leave you with questions that you can't answer, positions that you can't argue, and characterizations that you can't dodge.

 

Then you prevert (quick, catch the reference) those points into some grotesque thing that has lost all form and shape and isn't worthy of debating in any true intellectual sense.

 

My dad would always say, "if you debate with an idiot, any objective observer will be asking, 'whose the idiot.'"

 

I'll leave you to your idiocy.

 

 

For the last time, first you created a straw man and argued against "my position". When I called you on that, you tried to get out of it. When I wouldn't let you, you whined, threw up on the page, and finally admitted it. Then, I demanded that you respond to my actual point, and restated it:

 

I said "welfare hasn't delivered on it's promise to reduce poverty. It's been 60 years and we've either stayed the same or gotten worse, because welfare over-emphasizes the survival needs while creating deficits in the other 4....because it f'ing does." Then, you said "well, we'd need an interim solution...". To which I responded "When do you think these idiots will get to work on fixing this crap? Next year? IF the first 60 years is the beginning, then the next 60 is 'interim', with of course another requisite 60 years for the 'transition'". That is if we are to excuse Welfare's poor performance, or defend not changing it immediately, with your ridiculous "interim" excuse.

 

That's how we got to 180 years. A few individuals succeeding, IN SPITE Of, the generational debilitation of Welfare, does not excuse the massive problems it exacerbates, causes, and causes to be ignored. There is a time to enhance a design, and then, there's a time to scrap the thing and start over. Welfare's results clearly means the second choice is what is required.

 

And, Social security covers the type of disabilities you brought up, not welfare. Again, based on what you posted.

 

There was NEVER a "straw man." I categorically deny that.

 

I argued your position as I understood it. You made a blanket statement suggesting that[paraphrasing]: "Because welfare has continued institutionally for 180 years....the system must not have worked/be working/is broken."

 

I responded with the starfish analogy. In effect, it worked for some.

 

You talk about the "massive problems that it exacerbates, and causes to be ignored." But when pressed about that, you responded with [paraphrasing]:

 

1. Your experience with your school lunch program.

2. How it demoralizes folks.

3. That they're prioritizing survival over dignity (which is the single most idiotic thing that I've ever heard anyone say that wasn't purposefully comedic, or the product of some polemicist rant).

 

You haven't even supported this claim of "generational debilitation." Just because you say it, doesn't make it so. Just because there is an echo chamber that agrees with you, amongst predominately anti-welfare posters, doesn't make it so.

 

And NO, Social Security would not cover those disabilities based on how I presented it. I should know, because I presented the hypothetical. I should know also, because I know the legislation. The hypothetical didn't give enough detail to make that determination. This shows your poor command of policy, and fundamental issues with reading comprehension that standardized testing obviously did not address.

 

For all the reasons that I've stated, I'll just reference this post for all future correspondence with you.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Juror#8

[DC Tom]

...stuff...

 

I may have a ridiculous number of posts, but on a word-count basis I think you and OC already have me beat by a mile.

[....lybob]

I may have a ridiculous number of posts, but on a word-count basis I think you and OC already have me beat by a mile.

Don't worry you'll always have the most venom per word record, you !@#$ing senile prig.

[Juror#8]

You fascinate me. The quality of writing demonstrates heightened intelligence, yet the substance is contrived beyond belief.

 

Firstly, great post. I have some issues with a few points (discussed below), but definitely a lot of food for thought.

 

 

If you were talking about unemployment insurance you might have a point here. You're not so you don't. There are entire subcultures that live off of welfare for generations. And usually if you qualify for one form you qualify for it all. It becomes a hammock by which you have entire neighborhoods filled with people who don't pay rent, have no job, but get a check every month. It's not a case of someone paying into a risk pool and then reaping the benefit when bad luck befalls him.

 

As far as your parallel to auto insurance, which is absurd res ipsa loquitor, you've conveniently omitted the most fundamental distinction between the two which is that insurance is voluntary. And don't give me the bit about mandatory auto insurance (it's beneath both of us) because you don't have to drive and if you do you can choose which insurance company and plan to go with. No such choice on government welfare programs.

 

I bolded the sentence above because it seems to be the biggest point of contention. No less than four posters (You, GG, DCTom, and 3rdnlng), have mentioned the "risk" issue as if it were dispositive.

 

I just feel that techincally that is what taxpayers do. They collectively subsidize a system, that they may or may not use, and that provides a benefit to them if "bad luck befalls them."

 

The only difference is the variety in premium payments. But with some health insurance plans, especially employer-based health insurance, there is one set amount paid - nothwithstanding risk assessment or age. To be sure, my best friend has Kaiser Permanente for his health insurance. They pay 50.75 every two weeks for "single" employee health insurance. This amount is set, irrespective of risk factors. Every employee pays it who wants it.

 

Where is the determination of risk?

 

There is no "risk pool" there. There may have been some complicated actuarial analysis done that determined that risk is sufficiently extenuated at _____ amount for every person. But fuctionally, there was no "risk pool" that he pays into. There was no individual analysis done, nor is there an individual risk analysis undertaken for any of his fellow employees. He pays the same amount that every other "single" employee pays to have health coverage in the event that "bad luck befalls [him]."

 

In effect, his $50.75 he pays to Kaiser is no different than the $94.00 that he pays bi-weekely to help subsidize the social welfare system.

 

My guess is that the same cursory (comparatively speaking) analysis took place to determine maintaining the solvency of the Public Welfare system. There is no individual risk assessment - just a determination of how many are on the rolls, how many have come off, the annual fluctuations and how much money is required to account for everyone.

 

And as an aside, how can an Unemployment System quantifiably determine a propensity for being unemployed without running into some interesting constitutional legal challenges - especially if every state, dispensing federal monies, would have different criteria for what everyone pays based on debatably arbitrary personal history characteristics?

 

Don't worry, in fairness, I can also see the italicized paragraph in a light more favorable to your position.

 

On to your insurance point, just like you can avoid driving, and not have to pay automobile insurance, you can also not work, and avoid subsidizing the Public Welfare system.

 

Both are not plausible for the majority of Americans. And before you respond with, "you can still receive public welfare benefits if you don't work, whereas if you don't pay for automobile insurance the benefit evaporates," know that that wouldn't be an accurate statement (as I've mentioned in previous posts).

 

People are fond of mentioning the ineffectiveness of the "look-for-a-job" provisions in many public welfare plans. That's all fine and dandy. The more pointed criteria is, though, the provisions that place time limits on how long you can receive public welfare subsidies or that mandate repayment.

 

So could you benefit for a time without "paying in"? Sure. Will you have to work at some point and effectively subsidize the system retrospectively, yes.

 

So are there differences? Sure. Is the parallel exact? No. But is the calculated objective of any analogy to shadow its comparative counterpart? No. There are enough similarities that my claim wouldn't get dismissed on summary judgment. And I'm content arguing within the margins of that.

 

 

Already explained and you chose to ignore the explanation because if !@#$s up your argument. Your example best illustrates the dangers of letting government control various industries. Just as they took control of medicare and used it as leverage to justify further intrusion into private life (i.e. govt can tax the **** out of cigarettes, alcohol, certain foods, etc. because when you get old and sick your healthcare bills come out of my tax $$$), the feds inserted themselves into the student loan market making supply of funding for secondary education artificially high, thus jacking up tuition (not totally dissimilar from how relaxed home lending standards increased the supply of funds available for housing thus causing the price of housing to skyrocket).

 

So now if you want student loans, the private market that would otherwise exist does not exist, and the moron who wants to go to a private school to get a degree in women's studies is on equal footing with someone pursuing a quantitative degree to further a clear set career path with a high likelihood of ROI.

 

In a sane world a lender would look at your track record, projected career path, and likelihood of return on investment. Enter the government and the rest is history. So anyone who wants to pursue secondary education who doesn't have cash on hand is all but forced to deal with the feds AND has to pay higher tuition because of the perverse system the govt has created.

 

I think here you're arguing a point different than for the reason it was advanced and in a way that I don't entirely disagree with.

 

My mention of Federal Student Loans was as a quick reference bemoaning my experience with people who lament the welfare state as they're in line waiting on their student loan refund check so that they can buy a new vehicle.

 

You mentioned that people have to pay back student loans [paraphrasing]. I questioned that and introduced data in support. I also suggested that most who received public welfare subsidies "pay it back."

 

Now you're arguing the merits of federal government inclusion into traditionally private commercial spaces such as lending.

 

Since that was never a point of contention between us, I'm only going to address it cursorily. That is to say, I agree with you: The Feddy Gov should be loathe to enter into lending, especially mortgage lending. It's not their place. Technically, I don't see where I-8-XVIII empowers it (as an attorney, you see where I'm going with that).

 

But then again, they can always fall back on Wickard.

 

Here again you're making the argument for temporary unemployment insurance but using it to justify something that is so far removed from what you're actually defending. It would be like me stating that recreational use of heroin should be allowed and supporting it by presenting the arguments for pot. Only yours is even worse than that because at least then we'd be dealing with the same basic questions of drawing the line between personal liberty and public health and safety. Your argument is more akin to claiming recreational heroin use should be allowed and supporting it by arguing the value of anesthesia for invasive operations.

 

Additionally, the "look for work" provisions are great if you're looking at the situation through den mother tinted glasses. However, in reality, there is virtually no way to enforce these. You put in a few resumes and you meet your requirement. I know plenty of people bleeding that system right now.

 

As mentioned above, it's not just about the "look for work" provisions.Truthfully, it goes beyond that. Unemployed can't turn down a job offer and still continue receiving benefits. Most importantly, there are time limits on how long they can accrue benefits.

 

 

If history has taught us anything it is that government is inherrently inefficient. There are many essential functions for which government is necessary (see article 1 sec 8). An argument can be made that some social welfare provided for by government is desirable. That does not negate the fact that government is poorly equipped for efficient implementation of such a thing, it just means that in some situations (and reasonable men will differ as to where this line should be drawn) the end outweighs the expense.

 

If government doesn't do it, who will? That is an argument that has spanned this country's history. There are so many instances where **** is going so wrong and the only organization centralized enough, or willing enough, to do anything, is the government.

 

The Body Politic is too stupid, or too complacent to do anything about it en masse (which is what is required to effectuate change). If we left things up to the people, I'd still be drinking out of negro water fountains, and 1/3 of the population would have dysentery.

 

I'm a conservative. I tend to lean Republican (Clinton, Bush, Bush, write-in, probably Huntsman write-in) but I'm also a realist. And the reality of the situation is that the government became so empowered because of individual innaction. And a governmental devolution from these things will leave a power vaccuum that no individual/private group will likely fill in to address. Why? Because when vox populi had the chance to preemptively deal with the management of these sociological considerations, they didn't. So why would they take the iniative now when government bereaucratized it, exacerbated it, and [though managing it] fu(ked it all up?

 

So there has to be a middle-ground between these two things (innaction and inexpert inefficiency). Until then, I'll be a conservative who believes in government intervention to manage domestic concerns that require too much coordination for any private entity to willingly undertake.

 

I don't really take issue with your description of the cycle, nor am I pushing for a return to the Articles of Confederation. I just don't follow you so far as to assume that the absence of our various forms of public welfare as they currently exist would lead us down that path.

 

There are analagous instances throughout history. If the government further degrades an abjectly impoverished class by not providing them any level of sustenance, it will result in a permanent sub-class of folks who will not operate within the established legal framework because that is the same institution that endeavored to forget them.

 

 

You guys are really sensitive.

 

 

 

As to #2, we're back to the unemployment insurance model, unless you're arguing the case of social security, which is a ponzi scheme and is unsustainable as it is but can't be modified because of its "third rail" status. In the mean-time it's an anchor around our proverbial necks and its dragging us under. (Not just ss, but that, medicare, govt pensions, etc.)

As far as how to solve the problem, cutting the cord is obviously not an option, which is one of the reasons we should be damn careful before haphazzardly introducing new sweeping government entitlements like the Bush Medicare bill and Obamacare, especially when the country's going bankrupt. Because people become reliant on the systems that are put in place and they fundamentally change the landscape such that you can't just pull the plug and go back to how it was before, because the previous institutions no longer exist as they did prior to the government intervention BECAUSE of said intervention. But a gradual weening off the government tit might be the only way to avert imminent economic destruction.

 

That's an uphill battle because morons like DIN are numerous and they can't get their narrow minds around the outrage of someone not getting the best medical treatment money can buy to see the plain and simple truth that there is nothing noble or compassionate about pledging resources you don't have, regardless of how good that cause may look on paper. Nor can they bring themselves to accept the fact that government funded retirement and health care isn't going to be worth **** if the economy collapses.

 

1. I've discussed the "unemployment insurance" thing above.

 

2. Social Security is not a Ponzi Scheme. Raising the cap some will ensure solvency.

 

3. Yes, the system sucks. Something needs to be done about it. We agree there. I'm just not sure what the solution is.

Edited January 11, 2012 by Juror#8

[Dave_In_Norfolk]

Yes!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/12/us/more-conflict-seen-between-rich-and-poor-survey-finds.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23

 

 

Conflict between rich and poor now eclipses racial strain and friction between immigrants and the native-born as the greatest source of tension in American society, according to a survey released Wednesday.

[GG]

Yes!

http://www.nytimes.c...lines&emc=tha23

 

 

 

 

You mean if you keep harping on a topic long enough, your readers will think it's a real issue? Wow, blow me down.

[Jauronimo]

Yes!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/12/us/more-conflict-seen-between-rich-and-poor-survey-finds.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23

Lets all join Dave in reveling in Obama's divisive campaign of class warfare. That's exactly the type of leadership this country needs right now. A multimillionaire champion of the poor who condemns the rich before flying out to Martha's Vineyard. Stunning success, Dave.

Edited January 12, 2012 by Jauronimo

[Dave_In_Norfolk]

Lets all join Dave in reveling in Obama's divisive campaign of class warfare. That's exactly the type of leadership this country needs right now. A multimillionaire champion of the poor who condemns the rich before flying out to Martha's Vineyard. Stunning success, Dave.

Obama? I don't think he deserves the credit. He didn't foreclose on Anyones home, lay anyone off or ruin their 401k. Gotta give the credit whees it's due on that

[drinkTHEkoolaid]

Yes!

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/12/us/more-conflict-seen-between-rich-and-poor-survey-finds.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23

You do realize this is a result of failed liberal ideology right ? You posting that as some type of shocking find ironically shows the faults and results of what you continously defend.

 

take the blinders off and try to come up with an independent conclusion by investigating the root cause of said racial/economic strain. and taxing millionaires is not the answer.

Edited January 12, 2012 by drinkTHEkoolaid

[Dave_In_Norfolk]

You do realize this is a result of failed liberal ideology right ? You posting that as some type of shocking find ironically shows the faults and results of what you continously defend.

 

take the blinders off and try to come up with an independent conclusion by investigating the root cause of said racial/economic strain. and taxing millionaires is not the answer.

Posting as what? You are not blindly ideological?