Rev. Erudite Redneck, B.S., B.S., M.A., M.Div.

Teditor: Weigh on. Disagree. Agree. Whatever. Don't try to be funny for the sake of it. ER is pissed and he wants to stay pissed until someone convinces him this was a good thing.
 

I'm not gonna pull out the Constitution again, but . . .

Spending must be cut. It is not the role of government to support the poor with the money from the not-quite-so-poor. It all makes perfect sense to me. If you feel so strongly about it, go and sell all that you own and give it away. Shoot, I guess that since you think the government should go deeper in debt to pay for these 'sevices', you might as well do it too - sell all you own and run up your credit cards. Then get a few friends to do the same and in no time you'll have made up for the government's shortfall.
 

If the government's debt problem was tied to these services, maybe. But it's tied to a war and the Republican's addiction to Big Business bail-outs.

Re, "It is not the role of government to support the poor with the money from the not-quite-so-poor."

Actually, I pretty much fundamentally disagree with that. But I'll take it as a starting point:

If you're arguing for the government to get completely the hell out of having anything whatsoever to do with production, then I'll at least accept the morality -- or at least the amorality -- of an argumment that says the government should not involve itself with consumption.

But, I don't believe either is the case. Support the economy, even if that means subsidies on the production end. And support the people, with subsidies on the consumption in.

I've got an amendment for the Constitution: an economic bill of rights.
 

Economic Bill of Rights (here, Rem's head explodes):

http://www.worldpolicy.org/globalrights/econrights/fdr-econbill.html
 

More, from the -- horrors!! -- ACLU:

http://www.aclu-sc.org/About/EconRights/
 

An irony (or something):

In high school, I didn't take vo-ag because back then you couldn't be in FFA (Future Farmers of America, to any lurking city types) and still be on the college-prep track.

So I was in FBLA (Future Business Leaders of America). And I was the chaplain.

:-)
 

Okay, let's say we agree that some spending must be cut. Lots o' pork in many of these bills coming through, so that may be a great place to start. Big headlines about the Alaska "bridges to nowhere" being cut, but if you read closely, Alaska still gets the money to spend any way they want, including on these bridges. So, good PR but bad facts on closer examination. Take a look at the energy bill; when they testified before Congress last week, even the oil execs admitted they didn't need the tax incentives in the bill.

The big enchilada obviously is the extension of the tax cuts. Fine to say cut spending, but what about an examination of the revenue side. If the Repubs can sleep at night knowing that they have cut aid to the poor while rewarding high wage earners in the country (and I happen to be one of them), then so be it.

And, of course, let's not ignore a significant factor in the explosion of the debt . . . the Iraq war and reconstruction efforts there. Personally, I'd be fine with tax cuts if we could redirect the money being spent in Iraq to pay for the money they just cut from Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps, student loans, etc. It's all about what your personal priorities are, and these would be mine.
 

The key phrase:
by curbing rapidly growing benefit programs such as Medicaid, food stamps and student loan subsidies. Republicans said reining in such programs whose costs spiral upward each year automatically is the first step to restoring fiscal discipline.

So in reality, it's not a cut in spending, it is really just a decrease in the increase, which liberals always call a "cut." Another misuse of the term. The GOP is not cutting spending, they are just not allowing it to grow as fast. The country will spend just as much next year on those programs as it did this year. So where is the cut?

More liberal propaganda.
 

(head exploding)
 

The first damns step to restoring fiscal discipline is rubbing out tax cuts that should never have been made in the first place.
 

ER, I'm assuming that you benefitted from said tax cuts. Even if you didn't, many folks who are vocal in their criticism did. Just because a tax cut is available doesn't mean you must take advantage of it. Send the IRS a check. Warren Buffet did.
 

I don't know if I did or not. Dr. ER is the in-houde tax professional.

On cuts in growth, as opposed to cuts:

I don't give a damn if it's a cut in growth, it's still going backwards in a world that continues to go forwards. In other words, the population of this country is growing, so of course spending is growing. What??
 

I gave away my "tax cut" too. I'm sure that my $300 check is just gonna make up for millions of dollars in aid for heating assistance to the poor. Not.

And that's the problem with the bullshit "if it bothers you, be charitable" explanation. Basic economics: a nickel from everyone in American, given to programs that benefit the public good, goes a LOT farther than even very large charitable donations, simply because of the economics of scale. If you don't believe in the public good, why not just be an anarchist?
 

"a nickel from everyone in American, given to programs that benefit the public good, goes a LOT farther than even very large charitable donations, simply because of the economics of scale."

So why take that nickel away from someone without their permission instead of politely encouraging them to give it willingly and cheerfilly, out of altruism and generosity?

That is legalized stealing. Just because it's legal for the government to steal our money, it doesn't make it right.

Or don't you trust your fellow man to give out of his abundance?

The traditional Republican belief is that Americans are a generous people who can and will take care of each other without being commanded to by a government that can't even manage it's own budget, let alone mine.

One needs to look no further than the America's response to the devastation of Hurrican Katrina to see proof that the people are much more responsible than the government to decide how best to spend our money.
 

It is not the role of government to economicaly subsidize those who either can't or won't provide for themselves. Anarchists want no government. I want a government to do what it is chartered to do.
 

OK, hall monitor, I don't get involved in these conversations, but Mark's comment warrants one.

WHAT?

Republican or Democrat, liberal or conservative, common sense makes sense. Your rational doesn't. Claim your political side if you like, but making such comments is beyond the realm of partisan politics. I'm not a stab at a person, just the comments made.

Those comments are made of simpleton means -- deficient in judgment, good sense or intelligence.

That said, I await comedy, giddiness and knee-slappin' fun.
 

well if it is not the role of the
goverment to take care of those
who can't or won't. Then keep
all our money here. Stop sending
to all the nations around the
world who are starvin. Then the
rich can get richer! In a few
years it won't matter anyway
all those that can't or won't
will be gone. No food No housing
No money..BE DEAD SOON...Then all
those people who are concerned
about having to take care of
some one else, can go to church,
meet all there well to do folks,
go home and feel good about
there selves..I am with ER
I do not know how they sleep
at night.
 

This is a silly argument. "Your" money isn't really "yours"--it comes to you in large part because you are depending on government subsidies. The roads you drive on to go to work, the education you've been given, tax structures that have encouraged or discouraged certain kinds of businesses, I could go on. The ridiculous notion that "my" paycheck is "mine," with absolutely no relationship to the broader world I live in, is one of the silliest arguments of economic conservatives.

And it is the government's responsibility to ensure and promote the public good.
 

"One needs to look no further than the America's response to the devastation of Hurrican Katrina to see proof that the people are much more responsible than the government to decide how best to spend our money."

No, Mark, one need look no further than outside the doorway of an office building in any major or mid-sized city in the country to see that this is not the case. If you do not see the hundreds of thousands living in the streets who are being served neither by the government nor private sector charities, then you truly are blind.
 

Jeannie's right - we should stop sending our money to foreign nations. Keep it at home.

As to Dr. B's arguments:
The roads you drive on to go to work - specific taxes pay for those roads. It's not a subsidized thing. If the government didn't create the roads, business would (eventually). I'll take it a step further and say that the government gets involved with roads too much. I had to give an easement 60 ft wide x 1/4 mile long for a road running alongside my little farm. That's nearly 2 acres. On top of that, I ended up maintaining said road for most of 3 years. It was finally paved, causing my property taxes to go up. Now, tell me how I should appreciate the government for roads again.
the education you've been given - I paid quite a bit of money for my education and I worked pretty darn hard to get it. Most of my primary and secondary education came from public schools, so maybe you have a point there - but really, how much do most people profit from those educational years. I guess you can argue that the first $5.00/hr in my paycheck is a result of that education - but that's a stretch.
tax structures that have encouraged or discouraged certain kinds of businesses - well, I work for a defense contractor. our primary customer is the US Navy. That's defense spending. The US Constitution explicitly gives Congress the purview of defense spending.

My paycheck is, indeed, mine. I give generously to church, charitable organizations, conservation groups, and my alma mater. These I do for the 'public good'. I do not need the government to do it for me. It is not their job.
 

FBLA hadn't really worked out for you has it.
 

You ain't gittin my $784/year tax cut. Buy Gawd, it's going to WalMart every frickin Friday!
 

Actually, Rem, it is the government's job, and it should be. For if you give to church, your alma mater, other charitable organizations and do not take care of those things that are otherwise important (and, truthfully, who of us would?), then taxes are necessary.

I believe we pay just a certain percentage of our income toward taxes, for the most part, and that it should be that way across the board. It's not always going to be that way, primarily because fat cats find ways around paying their fair share.

But, alas, taxes do more good than evil, and that's the primary goal.
 

Woo hoo. Glad to see this went somewhere. I had to leave the office for a few hours.

The notion that business would provide roads and other sufficient infrastructure if the government didn't is just pure horse shit.

Read some economic history!

The only reason there is even electricity in rural areas to this day is because those government-sponsored "communist" cooperatives took it upon themselves because there was no PROFIT to be made from stringing the lines!

Same for the damn railroads -- although they have their own sins to answer for.

Same for public utilities and water systems.

Being for tax cuts is one thing. Believing there is anything like a conscience in the greater business world is lunacy.

That's even one thing ol' Tug and I agree on: Business is in business for one thing -- PROFIT.

And government is there to pry some of it out of their stingy fingers for the common good.
 

BTW, I got what I call a Dumbass Excise Tax while I was out.

For forgetting to put 50 cents in a parking meter at a local college, I get to contribute $20 to the general operations fund for the university parking ands transportation services department. (I just called to ask where the Dumbass Excise Tax actually goes, and that's where).
 

ER,

I'll counter your argument by saying that if the government had left well enough alone, alternative energy sources would be alot closer to reality. Today, out here in the sticks, I've got two friends (a friend and an aquaintance, really) who, because it was cheaper, set up solar panels on their property rather than paying to have lines run out to them. Ingenuity was stifled by the REA. What's unprofitable to one business sector is quite profitable to a niche market. Government may make things easier and get them done faster in the short run, but you've got to think long term.
 

Congratulations ER, you have just contributed to 'the good of society'. (insert sarcastic grin here).
 

Yes, I did. 'Cause I was ignorant.

Hey, if we could tax ignorance, all our problems would be solved.

However -- ahem, you had to see something like this coming! -- said taxes would still result in Republicans paying more.

Zing! Juss a joke! (Teditor, here is your "in.")
 

Taxing ignorance. Hmmmm. If'n we jiss tax Capital Hill, we, the United States of America, would be able to pay fer anything we damn well please.

Or we could tax comments made on certain Web sites, givin' the cash to the blog-holder. Shoot, ER, you could quitcher job and do this full time.

Of course, a portion of them taxes'd come outta yer own pocket. :-)
 

Are any of you going to College now or in the future? Your Children?
Do any of you have current garuanteed student loans? Will you or your children need future student loans? Do you work at a school that has students with Federal Loans?
Any Veterens who use VA services on Base? Family that does?
Any body divorced, have family that need child support?
Do you have a child going to school next to a military base, that has on base schools?
Do you want Bush's NASA moon and Mars program exist?
Do you want your taxes to support AMTRAK somewhere except only on the East and West coast?
Do you watch PBS?
Do you hunt or fish on federal lands?
Do you fly the friendly skies of American air space with an FAA traffic controller?
Do attend or work at an A&M university?
Do you work at any University, College etc.?
Were you counting on Hydrogen Fuel in the near future?
Are any of you famers or have family that are famers who use the county agent for any purpose?
Anybody here rely on the Davis Bacon Act for protection of your wage levels?
Well folks you are screwed.
Read it and weep!
The above is only a fraction of the story.
Before you bullshit your opinions about what these budget cuts will do, read about yourself and where you fit in.
I can't find the complete current bill on the web, but there is a copy still up on an Arizona Republican's web site from the end of Sept. It hasn't changed much. Read it fast, when he figures out that people are reading it he will take it down..
http://johnshadegg.house.gov/rsc/RSC_Budget_options_2005.doc
 

Teditor, fun time is over.

Drlobojo is in the house -- making painful sense, as usual.
 

DAMN YOU, Dr. Lobojo! :-)

He did make more sense than a number of posters are willing to consider. Hell, I'm still going to enjoy watching the reactions to his post.
 

Ok boys and girls,more things to thinks about, where will that money go that they are going to save by haveing you, and your city, your county, and your State take up the slack? How about PORK?
Except to Oklahoma because our bright Senator pissed off the Alaskan senator in charge of pork.

Number of Pork Projects in Federal Spending Bills

2005 - 13,997
2004 - 10,656
2003 - 9,362
2002 - 8,341
2001 - 6,333
2000 - 4,326
1999 - 2,838
1998 - 2100
1997 - 1,596
1996 - 958
1995 - 1439
 

Hey Teditor, Er, et. al.
The fun is just begining, not just for Republicans for the sour old Democrats as well. If they pass this nut cutting bill, it may start a through the bums out movement, all of the BUMS. It will be a truely bi-partisan massacre'(I hope).
As a John Spruce Populist I will enjoy that day.
 

I would not oppose a general House cleaning -- if the result is fewer from reps from gated communities, and all that implies, and their wannabes.
 

Sic 'em, Dr. Lobojo! :-)
 

Well, I answered 'yes' to only two questions on Dr. Lobojo's list. Truthfully, I can live without either and I won't notice much difference.
 

My list is incomplete. Read the bill.
 

Read it. There were a couple of things put in that I'd have rather not seen put in, but in reality, the federal government probably shouldn't have been funding them in the first place.

Why must the federal government provide funding for everybody's special projects? Let us limit the role of the feds and increase the role of the state and local governments.

I shoulda been born 200 years earlier . . .
 

Rem, you'll notice the difference when drug addicts roam the streets, crime goes up, you can't hire anyone because they aren't educated and when the United States finally sucks hind tit to China and who knows what all else.

But we'll all have flags to wave.
 

ER,

Do you read what I write? Let the local taxing authorities pay for local issues. I don't know how to make my position any more clear.
 

Thanks for reading it Rem. That may make about two of us. I agree that much of the stuff there needs to go down, but not go down "Cold Turkey".
However, when they start screwing with the Air Traffic Control System, are they friggin nuts?
You would think that these Congressmen could identify with the need to fly safely, in that they do it more often than most people. If they can't identify with such, then how bright can they be? Is it possible that when 400++ something pretty bright Congress persons come together that there is IQ lowering effect?

I'm going to go watch "Firefly", see you all latter.
 

If you really think businesses would eventually build the roads, take a look at the coal camps of eastern Kentucky where I was born. The coal companies owned the roads, owned the housing, owned the only stores, owned the schools, owned it all. They had no health insurance, no pensions, no running water, and the only pavement was for the coal truck routes. It took labor unions and uprisings and deaths for the business side to give a damn about the employees. Big business is not going to give one inch more than they are legally required to. Have you considered trying to live on minimum wage? How about paying fopr child care on minimum wages? I make more, and at 40 hours a week, I'm still eleigible for state health insurance because the company-sponsored insurance was taking 45% of my pay. The government is not subsidizing me because I don't work... 'cause I do. Meanwhile, Big Business fights tooth and nail against any raise in the minimum wage, while enjoying record profits. I don't recall seeing any corporate executives having to choose between the heat bill or groceries.
 

Rem, re: "I paid quite a bit of money for my education and I worked pretty darn hard to get it."

I promise you, you did not pay a sizeable fraction of what it cost to educate you -- and I'm talking about college.


Rem again, re: "Well, I answered 'yes' to only two questions on Dr. Lobojo's list. Truthfully, I can live without either and I won't notice much difference."

So TF what. This country, and this society is not pay-as-you-go whenb it comes to government services. This reminds me of the jerks who think they shouldn't have to pay school taxes because they don't have any kids in school! Gah ...


Miss Cellania: Thanks, Cuz. Come back often! West Virginia, east Kentuck and all, ain't that much different at all from eastern Oklahoma, my original stompin' grounds -- and still damn near as "yellow dog" as it comes.
 

Ok. I never said we didn't need some taxes. But taking from hard working tax payers to give to welfare brats makes no sense. Don't even try to tell me that throwing all that tax money at the poor will solve the problem. It hasn't yet, and it won't. All it does is encourage them to stay on the dole.

You want to help the poor? So do I. But it doesn't help them to reward them for not trying to better themselves.

Before any of you tell me I don't know what I'm talking about, walk a mile in my shoes. I've been on welfare. I've lived in public housing. I have had many friends that are 2nd and 3rd generation welfare receipients. They don't work because they get all they need from the government. Why milk the cow when you get the milk handed to you?

Now, if the Welfare state will come up with programs designed to educate, train, do job placement etc, as a condition of receiving aid until they can get themselves off welfare, I am all for that.

But they don't. And YOUR tax dollars are paying for their abortions and their designer clothes and 150 dollar shoes, and they take and take and take and the taxes keep going higher and higher. I have seen the effects of this flawed system first hand. I have seen able bodied men and women who do nothing but sit in their front yards and complain that the government doesn't
give them enough money. Men and women who are the children of other able bodied men and women who also sat in their front yards and complained that the government doesn't give them enough. Don't EVEN tell me I don't know what I'm talking about.

You people who call me ignorant cause I don't agree with you even though you never spent a second living on welfare are the real ignorant ones. Gawd, I hate pompous know it all assholes like you! You think because you have a degree in something that you have all the answers. You don't. I call people like you educated idiots. If you never lived it, you have no authority to speak on it, because you don't know what you're talking about. Book learning will never teach you the truth.

And the government does nothing to help them get out of the system. In fact, by giving them more money for every child they have, they are encouraging the welfare brats to have even more illegitimate children so they can get more money so they can buy more crack and on and on and on. If you don't believe it I challenge you to drive over to the other side of the tracks and spend some quality time with them. But lock your car doors and bring a gun to defend yourself. They don't care if your taxes are paying their way. If you have a nickle in your pocket they will want that, too. I know this. I have lived it.

My son grew up in the ghetto when I was down on my luck and living there. Last August, while he was loitering (instead of looking for work) around with his friends who are still on welfare, someone fired an AK47 automatic assault rifle into the crowd, killing 2 young girls and wounding 9 other people, one of them my son, who was shot in the back. The bullet hit his spine but fortunately didn't sever the spinal chord. He now suffers so much pain that he can't do physical labor.

Welfare has helped to create this situation. Don't tell me it is a good thing to take from honest hard working people and give it to these unappreciative welfare cheats.

I do agree that spending is out of control, but so is taxes. And it won't solve anything to raise them. Not without serious reform.

And before you all get offended, remember, if the shoe fits, wear it. Otherwise it doesn't apply to you so no need to be offended.
 

Mark has come unhinged.
 

Points of fact about how much you pay for your education.
In Oklahoma:

If you go to a University and pay for an Freshman English course, you pay almost the whole bill or more.
If you go to a two year school, you will pay about 30% of that Freshman English course's cost.

If you go to a University and take a Junior course in Engineering you will pay about 25% of the course cost. For a graduate course in Engineering you will pay about 15% of the course cost. For a graduate course in English you will pay about 25% of cost.

If you chose to and can be enrolled in an M.D. program at the Health science Center at O.U. or Vet Med. at OSU, you will pay an average of about 15 % of your course cost.

As a general average you will pay about 25% of the cost of an Associates degree. You will pay about 20% of the cost of a Bachelors degree. You will pay between 10% and 20% of the actual cost of any doctoral degree.
These are all for Oklahoma and are two or three years old.

In General the Arts and Science Student and the Liberal Arts students pay a larger percentage share for their education than the hard science or tech students.

As an excercise in extremes, if you take a two year level course in Radiological Technology you will pay somewhere around 5 % of the cost.
Can you go to your school and find out what percent you are paying? Absolutely NOT. You will have to use your states freedom of information act and do the math yourself, or have worked in the damn system and have access to the data.
 

Especially this part. He can't wrap his brain around the fact that most of us who are educated HAVE been poor as shit. Talk about a pompous ass. It b'lieve he has it backwards.

"You people who call me ignorant cause I don't agree with you even though you never spent a second living on welfare are the real ignorant ones. Gawd, I hate pompous know it all assholes like you! You think because you have a degree in something that you have all the answers. You don't. I call people like you educated idiots. If you never lived it, you have no authority to speak on it, because you don't know what you're talking about. Book learning will never teach you the truth."

No shit, Sherlock. LIFE is what teaches most people, and softens their heart. Somehow it hardened yours. What the heck happened?

(My wiord verification is "FUMIN" -- and how.
 

That's good data, Techrep. Gracias.
 

I've been alive long enough that "pompuos ass", as is "know it all", and plain ole "asshole" are on my list of names that I have been called.
Mark did you miss noticing the Welfare Reform Act of the Mid- 1990's? A lot of what is being said is Republican talking points from the 1980's. Welfare requirement changed to pretty tough standards in the 90's.
That said howver, as Jesus said, the poor shall be with you always, and the hard core still are. Can we fix them? Hell no! What shall we do with them? How about we keep them well fed enough and well cloth enough to let them sit around and complain about the government not being generous enough. that way they will be too damn lazy to get up off their butts and wander into our neighborhoods and bothe my property or come up with some damn idea of rioting or insurrection.
As Andy Granatelli says, "You can pay me now or you can pay me latter."
Most poor people are in transition just like you were. But for the hard core, well, bread and circus.

Now when you are talking about the corporate slaves that Miss Cellania is talking about that's a whole nother subject. I have one recomendation for that problem; UNION NOW
 

Do you deduct mortgage interest from your taxes?

Ever looked into the history of redlining, zoning, FHA loans?

Were your parents college educated? Did they have high school diplomas?

Very few people are self-made. The jobs we have where we earn "our" money are the accumulation of our parents' experiences, their grandparents' experiences; our connections and theirs; attitudes and beliefs they had (e.g., "get an education") that were the result not only of their personal experience but also of a belief that it could be done, that doing it would pay off, that the world was safe enough to forego X years of income in order to study. Or whatever your own particular story is.

And a lot of those things are the result of deeply buried histories of government aid projects--FHA loans to encourage home ownership (but not for blacks), urban renewal projects, government-funded and tax-subsidized (including tax breaks) infrastructure; insuring the banks; etc. etc.

It's no insult to say that we owe a lot to the government. It's called being thankful for what we've got, what our parents had, and their parents before them---all the things that have helped us get where we are.

And not begruding others who haven't been so lucky some of the same kinds of help.
 

Not unhinged, ER, the word is Pissed. Because I have had to experience first hand what robbing the rich to pay the poor has accomplished for the good of people. Absolutely nothing. Unless you consider another whole generation of dependents who have no intention of ever bettering themselves. I never received anything I didn't either work for or have to degrade myself to get.

You who have never had to depend on the government don't have a clue how humiliating and degrading it is to have to grovel for 300 dollars or less a month.

Taxing for welfare has never done anyting positive for the poor and it never will. Stop living in a fantasy world.
 

By the way, here in Maryland we have to pay a "Flush tax"...That's a tax on flushing our toilets.

Really.

Here's an idea. All you people who really think taxes actually help the poor can pay taxes, the rest of us that know better can be allowed to keep out money and use it to help the people who really need it.
 

By the way ladies and gentlemen the house passed the $50 B. in spending cuts, and the Senate passed the $60 B. in tax cuts tonight. (woops that doesn't add up does it?) It ain't the just the real poor who got it in the rear tonight. Unless there is someone on this blog that makes 7 figures a year, we all took a piece of the action.
Good luck and Good night.
 

Mark said:
"And YOUR tax dollars are paying for their abortions ....."

Mark missed the 90"s Welfare reform, so I guess he missed the 70's Hyde amendment as well.
What is the Hyde Amendment?
Passed by Congress in 1976, the Hyde Amendment excludes abortion from the comprehensive health care services provided to low-income people by the federal government through Medicaid. Congress has made some exceptions to the funding ban, which have varied over the years. At present, the federal Medicaid program mandates abortion funding in cases of rape or incest, as well as when a pregnant woman's life is endangered by a physical disorder, illness, or injury.
Most states have followed the federal government's lead in restricting public funding for abortion. Currently only seventeen states fund abortions for low-income women on the same or similar terms as other pregnancy-related and general health services. Four do it voluntarily, the remainder do it under a state level court order.
 

Drlobojo, Boy are you naive! Welfare brats are poor, not stupid. They can come up with all kinds of clever ways to get over on the law.

They get abortions on your dime, don't ever think they don't.

And by the way, Abortion isn't health care. It's killing babies. Softening the semantics doesn't change the facts.

Aren't you glad your own mother didn't exercise her right to that kind of "health care"?
 

Everyone benefits from public spending on education, whether you have children or not, whether you take advantage of it or not. We (as a nation) are now trying to educate those who will build the bridges, fight the wars, interpret the law, and prescribe our medications when we are old.

Regarding welfare dependents: In any large system, there will always be those who try to "work" the system to their advantage. Its a small minority that usually gets way more publicity than they should. They are also more concentrated in certain areas, making them more visible. But for every person who uses public assistance as a lifestyle, there are maybe a hundred others who use services temporarily, to get over a patch of rough times. These are the elderly who have paid taxes all their lives, the unemployed who've worked before and will work again, people who work but also have young children or disabled people to take care of, and the sick. The most common reason for bankruptcy is medical expense. These folks don't go around telling everyone that they applied for any kind of assistance.

Doing away with public assistance programs would throw out the baby with the bathwater, abandoning all to punish the few who abuse the system.

Ultimately, a society will be judged on how it treats its weakest members.
 

re: "But for every person who uses public assistance as a lifestyle, there are maybe a hundred others who use services temporarily, to get over a patch of rough times."

That statement is so wrong it would be laughable if it wasn't so tragic. You have the numbers reversed.

I almost wish you would have to be forced into the welfare system just to see hw wrong that statement is, but I wouldnt wish that lifestyle on my worst enemy.

See if you can picture this: I lived in public housing for 5 years, on a street with approximately 50 units. In that time I had 1 neighbor who worked her way out of welfare. That's 2 out of 50, including me, who also got out. the rest were quite content to sit around with their hands held out, popping out babies one after another, and complaining that the givernment didn't give them enough.

Screw your intellectual platitudes and quotes from long dead Greek philosophers, who lived and died long before America even existed. This is real lufe, not acadaemia.

You are just proving my point that education and intelligence are not the same thing.
 

And I didn't advocate doing away with assistance programs. I say it should only be used as temporary help until the receipient can get on their feet. It is not presently that way. Right now, it rewards sloth, it doesn't help anyone get ahead.

I still say for those who really need assistance, welfare should be given only with training and a workable plan to get them off welfare as soon as possible. I know about welfare reforms. They don't work as they are.

Apparently someone who actually has been there doesn't convince you, so if it takes reading a book to convince you, I suggest you read "Pimps, Whores, and Welfare Brats" by Star Parker... for those who only get their knowledge from books this should be a real eye opener.
 

Mark, I HAVE used public assistance before. To get over a rough patch. I just didn't live in public housing, didn't tell everyone my status, and signed off food stamps when our economic situation improved. I was never out of work. I still use state health insurance for my kids, even though I have a job. Yes, I am eligible. Yes, I make more than minimum wage. Still cannot afford to buy family coverage through my job... nobody at my workplace buys family coverage. Thats life in these economic times. I am part of the group that isn't noticed a lot, but we are there.
 

Mark,

It's amazing how you've internalized this thread. You brought overt attention to your own ignorance: "You people who call me ignorant cause I don't agree with you ... " Actually, I don't think anyone HAD called you ignorant to that point, bud.

But since you bring it up ...

Whatever your beef is, it's not with me, or any of the people you disagree with -- most of whom actually do, in fact, know more about government and welfare you than you do. Some of them have experience similar to yours plus the education that you so proudly lack.

You know your experience and what the talk radio idiots have told you, apparently, sinvce you've admitted previously that you don't read many books. That's like growing up on a wheat farm in western Oklahoma, listening to the local noon farm report, and thinking you know EVERYTHING about agriculture in the United States.

Your wider ignorance -- your personal experience is unassailable -- has nothing to do with the lack of letters behind your name. It has everything to do with your apparent willful meanness and your obvious resentment against those "poor" people that made you feel so degraded by their mere proximity. You lived in the projects. Get over it.

And calling Drlobojo "naive" is really funny. I mean comical.

Your anger at educated people and academia is pathetic. Why don't you get an education so you know more about what you like to talk about? It's not too late.

Warning: You would have to use a government service, and that might make you feel uncomfortable.

Oh, and Star Parker is someone who ABUSED the welfare system, by her own admission, and now wants top abolish the whole damn thing to atone for her own sins. What crap. The fact that Rush Limbaugh supports her ALONE makes her suspect. Because the fact is he's not very smart, either. Just witty, which is not the same thing. Again, her experience is unassailable. But that does not make her a general expert.
 

Being on Public assistance temporarily while still working is a far cry from living in public housing in a major urban city for 5 years. Where you "go to the mattresses" on New Years eve and on the 4th of July for fear of stray bullets coming through the paper thin walls and killing your children. Where you hear automatic gunfire in close proximity every damn night. Try to imagine what it's like when your child doesn't come home on time and you don't know where he is and you go out looking for him while gunfire is going off on the next block. I still respectfully insist you have no clue.

Go find and read that book I mentioned. and while you're at it read Star Parker's other books, too. All of you could use the education.
 

I am not mean. What is mean is people who keep poor people down by not holding them accountable, and then trumpeting their benevolence from the rooftops.

That's it. I'm done with this.

Where arrogance exists there is no enlightenment. See you in the funny papers.
 

I am not mean. What is mean is people who keep poor people down by not holding them accountable, and then trumpeting their benevolence from the rooftops.

That's it. I'm done with this.

Where arrogance exists there is no enlightenment. See you in the funny papers.
 

Mark, I feel for the folks in those situations. They need help. The system needs to be more attuned to improving lives, yes, and it will take all of us and lots of tax dollars to do it. But we can't just abolish assistance programs.
 

Good freakin' riddance. If you don't get the idea, Mark, your ignorant comments shed a light on your personality.

How many times do we have to read (I'm not willing to go back and count because the redundancy was giving me a headache) that you've been on welfare. Obviously, you learned squat while there.

You condemn those of us with an education, but a few months back, you referred to Wichita State football, calling Wichita State your alma mater. By that, you're saying you graduated from WSU. Is that not an accurate statement?

I'm continually floored by your idiotic comments. If you were educated in Wichita and at Wichita State, they let you slip on through the system, that's for damn sure. I'm sad to say we're both from the great state of Kansas, because you shed a terrible light on the Sunflower State.
 

Enlighten me, Mark. How, by recognizing you make foolish comments, am I arrogant. I didn't say I'm better than you.

Facts are facts, Mark. You make foolish statements. I want to believe you're not that freakin' ignorant. But as I continue to read your posts on this blog, I become more and more convinced.

We all offer ourselves up for criticism when we do something like this in public. You, me, ER. And when you post things that are so completely void of common sense, you MUST be criticized.

Am I calling you an ignorant fool? I'll let your posts speak for themselves.
 

OK, mark was the first one to make this personal. He does that sometimes. I responded. And some others did. But that's it. No mas after this.

I will say this: the chief benefit of having Mark be a regular 'round here is that he is an excellent example and representative of a certain segment of the rank-and-file Right Wing. People whose own lefty-lib circles are small can benefit from the exposure.

Mark, seriously, as usual, your presence is welcome, whether I, or anyone here, thinks your comments are useful. Some are, of course.

And again, your own experience is your own experience, and no one can take that away from you. It's how you interpret it that leaves some of us aghast.
 

W/r/t the question of welfare dependency and public housing projects:

Yes, both of those can be problems. The first problem is based, in part--possibly in large part--on the fact that welfare was originally established in order to provide for widows. And the widows were expected *not* to work. In fact, at the time, the liberal argument was that welfare should allow recipients to work; the conservative, family-values type argument was that no, it shouldn't, because women shouldn't work. As a result, a system was created that forced people who needed the money to survive NOT to also do anything to supplement their incomes, to gain job experience, to develop connections and network, anything that might help them NOT be dependent in the long run. Laws against welfare recipients marrying or living with men created a similar problem, and forced a lot of people who needed the money to lie about employment or living situations.

Re. public housing projects--that, too, was the creation of a conservative, in this case racist & classist argument. In the 60s and 70s, "urban renewal" meant shifting the poor into redlined neighborhoods, thereby concentrating the most vulnerable. Development of housing projects reinforced the problem. Both of these forced a lot of perfectly decent people who *happened to be poor* into close proximity with a few real assholes. Compounding the problem, these new neighborhoods didn't get their fair share of public services--police coverage, garbage removal, parks, school spending, infrastructure maintenance and building--which meant that, left to their own devices and cut off from the larger community, they became ghettos in the worst sense of the word.

Both of those problems, yes, were the result of very poor government planning. They were not, however, the result of welfare per se.
 

Mark, I'm
Naive, well maybe so, on some things most probably, but on this no way. Citing facts and laws and credentials doesn't mean much to some whose angst, anomie, and anger cause a general projection of themselves on to those they oppose.
It is time to get off the backs of the Marks, for we will have them with us always, and get on to the backs of those that need our votes.

By the way, Rush Limbaugh has done a great service. He has provided a list of names and addresses of like minded people.

After the brown shirts served their function what happened to them?

History not only repeats itself it flows in loops and cycles. Turnings some have called them.

John Spruce where are you?
 

And, perhaps against my better judgment, on the question of Mark's attitudes and experience:

I've known a lot of people who grew up poor with similar beliefs. I suspect they come from laudable, and necessary, attitudes: one is that while poverty may be irreversible for most people, me and mine will be the exception, and the other is that hard work and self-reliance are the way up and out. I think that believing both of these things is probably *necessary* for people to drag themselves out of housing projects and ghettos; if you think that you're nothing special, you're less likely to try to differentiate yourself from your neighbors, and if you think that hard work is pointless, you're less likely to get your ass out of the ghetto.

FWIW, I admire the determination and grit it takes to get oneself out of a really shitty situation. I do, however, beileve that the situation should be such that people who AREN'T incredibly determined, incredibly stubborn, and incredibly hard-assed, can ALSO live decent lives and move into the working and middle classes.

I truly believe that the personal experiences of "those who've been there" are important. It's a big part of my feminist philosophy: we have to listen to people's first-hand evidence. We also, however, have to place that evidence in social, cultural, and historical context in order to understand it more broadly. Perpetuating, or strengthening, a system where only the very exceptional survive is, in my opinion, shitty public policy. The truth is that the vast majority of people, by definition, are NOT exceptional. Most people, placed in a dependent situation and surrounded by poverty and a weak connection to the broader public sphere, will develop mental health problems, attitudes, and beliefs that make it *more* difficult for them to change their situation. Figuring out a way to deal with poverty--which is indeed a *public* problem, as well as a personal one--in a way that helps even flawed, imperfect, and fucked-up people live decent lives is, I think, absolutely vital.

FWIW, I also think it's Christian.
 

And one last thing, even though this isn't my blog: I also assume that talking about these aspects of his past is difficult for Mark, even though I also assume that he is proud of having made it out. It seems a bit unkind--and also a poor persuasive technique--to jump all over someone who's volunteered some information that makes him vulnerable.

Of course, I'm also perfectly well aware that the rough & tumble can *also* be intended and interpreted as a play of equals, and that my attempt to be understanding might be interpreted as condescending. FWIW, I am perfectly sincere.
 

Bitch for president. ... Or, at least, HHS director.
 

I don't think I'm electable.
 

It's an appointed position (HHS) after all. You can ride on the coat tails of Teditor.
 

Fair enough, but I'm still not sure he'd appoint me. After all, look at what happened to Dr. Elders when she said that masturbation wasn't entirely evil.
 

Heck, yeah, I'd appoint ya. If it twern't fer masterbation, I'd a never lived this long. I've heard from women folk friends of mine that it's all about the buzz. Ain't that right, B?
 

To those who where offended by my comments toward Mark, I apologize. I had just had enough. Maybe that's why I should refrain from serious posts.
 

ER, don't worry about serious "posts" this one is a serious as it gets and it has already gotten around to masterbation. Although looking at the results of the tax cuts and program cuts, most of the sex discussed here on this post is not of the self inflicted kind.

I did want to ask B. what Dr. Elders ment by masterbation wasn't "entirely evil". Did she explain which was version was evil and which wasn't? Is there a sensory difference between the evil stuff and the other? Is there somthing I should have known all these years?
 

I'm guessin' B's at Saturday evenin' Mass, so maybe I can answer that: If you shout out the good Lord's name as you climax, it's almost like prayer. But if you're into more dirty talk -- aka, "Oh, f*&^ yeah. S%#!" -- it's more evil.

:-)
 

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
 

This went downhill fast. Teditor just can't resist bein' the class clown. Go stand in the corner, Teditor. Sheesh.
 

Will ya at least tell me when I can return from the corner.

Hey, I got all serious and stuff. I just took the opportunity provided. I had to make sure B had a spot on my Cabinet. Or anywhere else she wanted. :-)

OK, let's get all serious and stuff. Will the Cowboys smother them nasty Sooners?
 

As I said would happen, John Shadegg's site has taken down the Republican budget list.
 

Ive run a Q&D (quick and dirty) analysis of the cost to Oklahoma Higer Education alone over the next ten years if the House Budget cuts become the final version. I comes out to about $440,000,000 in direct cuts with maybe another $20,000,000 in administative cost the State didn't have before. Total is $460 mil. or about half a billion dollars. That's about $46 million per year, or with an average annual head count enrollment of about 220,000 students, that come to a loss per student of about $2,100 per year.
Now keep in mind, that is just Oklahoma Higher Education alone.
So how do the schools replace that money?
 

Is there an answer to that question?

That's just scary.
 

Lot of answers, but my guess is they raise tuition and cut services which generally means less faculty. Also you defer maintenance on facilities and maybe cap enrollments.
Shift all lower division course to 2 year schools where they cost less. Also you try to get a larger share from the general revenue fund read taxes) than you got before.
 

Or you can hope that drlobojo didn't do his math correctly.
For example adding one too many zeros to the last figure on per student cost per year which would be $210 per year not $2,100 per year. In that case they would just raise Tuition.
I really should not write these damn things after my bed time is past.
 

By "not entirely evil," I was, of course, engaging in a bit of dry minimizing. Her scandal--are y'all really too young not to remember this?--was suggesting that it should be taught in schools. By which, of course, she meant that sex ed should point out to students that masturbation is a good substitute for sex and carries none of the risks, but which enough loudmouths found scandalous that she was forced to resign.
 

Bush said "Tax cuts would help American families."

Yes, they did. The Exxon family, the Texaco family, the MicroSoft family, the Citibank family...The tax cuts were supposed to raise tax revenue, but the CBO's own estimates won't show an increase above the year 2000 benchmark until 2007, and all these corporations are feasting until then.

Meanwhile, as I pointed out on my blog here, poverty's up under Bush, and we're in real danger of seeing actual hunger in America.

Not, "oh dem fat po' needs to lose a l'il weight" mouthed by the porkrind eating NASCAR watching couch potatoes. I mean starvation. I mean families doing without food for days on end.

Wanna fix this country? It's time to take back some of those "rights" corporations earned under Nixon and Ford and Reagan, things that put them ahead of the citizens of this nation, and make this a country of, for and by people once more.
 

Wow, things really got a little heated on this here thread!

Re: the effect of the current round of tax cuts on the Oklahoma school system and how the state will replace that money. Of course that means higher tuition and fees at state universities. And of course that means less financial aid to poor students. So naturally that means less opportunity for those at the bottom end of the economic scale to work their way out of poverty with a college education. Which then results in more people who don't have the skills to compete for jobs that pay a living wage. Which then results in people earning sub-standard wages who must rely at least in some measure on the social welfare system, or who can't find jobs at all and have to rely wholly on the welfare system. Which then results in people like Mark referring to them as welfare kings and queens.

I'm all for not piling on people like Mark who comment. But let me say this: with all the various comments about designer clothes and $150 shoes, crack smoking, illegitimate children, "other side of the tracks" and "them", it couldn't be clearer that he's talking about black people. I'm not sure why he didn't just come out and say it rather than using all the Reagan-esque code words.
 

B, you're probably the youngest one commenting in this thread. The older you are, the more you forgret, as in the specifics of the Elder stuff.
 

Carl, welcome. I agree.

But back the hell off the pork rind eaters and NASCAR fans.

Dems don't come of their GD cultural high horse, they will NEVER get rural American back.
 

B, for a while I thought you might have a viable set of information that would improve my libido.
RSB, I'm usually atuned to racially charged writting. I didn't see Mark as meaning black only. The "Them" I read as, not me any more. Mark is an equitable offender, and should be seen that way I think.
And let me express my appreciation to Teditor, and Techrep, and other perfectionist in this blogverse for not taking an old man to task for not being able to do Math at Midnight.
Carl, Go right a head and don't "..back the hell off the pork rind eaters and NASCAR fans".
ER's not really very happy unless his blood is up and that will sure do it.
Now I'm going to put on some shoes and go out and watch Sunday morning coming down.
 

Pork rinds are gross and NASCAR is boring.

I'm not saying this out of cultural elitism; there are plenty of "low" things that I enjoy most thoroughly. But those two, ick.

Oh, and re. the "buzzing" comment, which I missed earlier, somehow; eh, sometimes, sure, but I'm a low-tech woman. Like in the kitchen, why use a gadget that you have to clean and store if you can do it perfectly well with your hands?
 

B, I'm also offended. I made a special comment just for you, and ... well, I'm not sure what to say at this point.

A friend has now started her own home business, kinda like Mary Kay and others. 'Cept it's for vibrating gadgets. Last time I was there, she said something about a party, handed a pamphlet to another woman and grinned sheepishly. So I asked, "Is that something you'd use in the bedroom with your husband ... or without him?"

She's the one who came up with the phrase, "It's all about the buzz, baby."
 

Dr. Lobojo,

Dude, you're thankin' the wrong person. I can't do math, so I didn't add your's up, even at midnight. :-) There's a reason I went into the writing skills.
 

ER should be home from church and going out to lunch soon and he can condense and comment on all this largess of opinion.
 

I'm just amazed at how far afield from an intitial topic a thread can go. :-)

One thing: Someone said something about "piling on" Mark. I reglanced at what he wrote and how people responsed to it.

While he wrotr provocative comments and expressed controversial opinions, I don't think anyone got personal with hin until so clearly internalized others' commnets and made them about himself.

Ergo, if there was any piling on, I think he asked for it. Maybe not. Neither this post, nor the thread, is about him.

Carry on.

(What IS that buzzin' noise?? If it ain't B, then it's Teditor, and that is grosser than B thinks pork rinds are.)
 

Dude, ya got it all wrong. I don't use 'em on myself. But I enjoy bein' in the room, sometimes in control, when i'tis bein' used. Whatever makes her sigh (or sigh and sigh and sigh and sigh and ... you get the idea) at the end is what I'm all about. :-)
 

What did ya'll do to this thread? I guess I missed the fireworks.

Re Carl - I find it funny that this guy comes here and denigrates pork rinds and NASCAR, seeing's how the name of the blog is the Erudite Redneck.

Re Elders - As the youngest poster around here, maybe my memory can help you out. Yeah, her masturbation policy did go against the grain and that was probably (if not definitely) the thing that got her canned. I'm one of those who disagreed with her - that doesn't belong in school. But she also did/said alot of other controversial stuff, including her support of marijuana. In what I thought was an astounding move, she jumped on the anti-tobacco bandwagon and on the legalize marijuana bandwagon at the same time. This was not too far removed from Nancy Reagan's War on Drugs (and Clinton's "I didn't inhale" crap), so it didn't sit well with alot of people.

Back to the original topic - there is no legal charter authorizing Congress to redistribute wealth.
 

No offense, REM, but you looking to the Constitution for justification for your own libertarian views makes as much sense as a socialist looking for express approval of a socialist approach to the U.S. economy.

Those are economic questions, and the Constitution doesn't address economics directly.

Perhaps you WERE born 200 years too late. That's fine stuff to talk about over beer.

But the politics of 1805 are downright laughable in 2005, and your tired clinging to what you THINK the Constitution means now keeps you out of the mainstream of political discussion. (No personal offense intended!)
 

OK ER. That's a fair statement. Let me ask you a question, though. When should we look to the Constitution? In today's political discussions, I see very few people that want to even acknowledge that the document exists. Sure, there are many (mostly on the left side) that speak up for a literal interpretation of the 1st amendment. Likewise, there are many from the right that seek a literal interpretation of the 2nd amendment. Maybe the 4th and 14th get brought up on occasion as well as the requirement for habeus corpus (sp?). Why pick and choose? If the document is not good enough, as you state, why not make a push for a new one?
 

Whoa. I do not believe the Constitution is not good enough. I believe it is EXACTLY good enough.

Just because I don't agree with the way a certain case is decided does not mean I think the system is faulty -- and that's a difference, I think, between where I stand and where the hard Right, and hard Left, stand.

Either extreme loses a case, and holy Gawdlemighty, they act like the world has come to an end, when all that's happened is they've lost a political argument that went headlong up against the dang law itself, which INCLUDES the courts' interpretation of it!

Don't look to lawmakers, of either persuasion, to look to the Constitution before proposing, or voting on, a law! That's silly. That's why the Constitution itself, and the judges appointed to interpret it, are there:

To rein in the lawmakers, whether they go too far to the right, or to the left -- or in some other direction they come up with a hundred years from now.

In a nutshell: We are right where we need to be in this country, as regards all the hottest topics of the moment, because BY DEFINITION, a free people is more apt to stumble into the truth, and a truth-seeking people is more apt to stumble into righteouness, than an oppressed people.

I do adhere to the politically incorrect, mystical notion of American Exceptionalism in some ways.
 

If it is exactly good enough, then how is it that we don't follow it? Why is it so wrong to want to go back to a weaker federal government countered by strong state governments? That's how this thing called the United States of America was set up. If wealth distribution must occur, and I strongly believe that it should not, let the states handle it. I'm sorry if that's not in the mainstream, but I think it should be.
 

ER just wrote the word Gawdlemighty, which, if you say outloud sounds like you got fried beans in your mouth.

Tone, tone, tone. I know. I'll move on.
 

Isn't that a song by the Byrds?
 

See, Rem, that's the deal: We ARE "following it," in the way that the founders intended, and the way John Marhall intended.

The only way to undo what IS, is to go back to the Marshall court and start afresh. And, as romantic and historical and cool as that sounds, that ain't gonna happen.

To think it will, is, I'm sorry, outside the mainstream. The way things are going, maybe in another 50 years or so, it WILL come full circle.

But not anytime soon -- not as long as SCOTUS justices adhere to the principle of "stare decisis" in interpreting the words of the Constitution as much as they do the words of the Constitution itself.

One thought: The Civil War did not politically settle any of the issues that tore the country apart back then. Those questions were subdued, not settled, by force of arms, and by a national government that had the Southern state governments at its military mercy.

It could be that the modern equivalent of a war will put some of those state-versus-federal issues front and center again.
 

Mark has totally mischaracterized his treatment here over at his place in a post today (Monday).

He confuses "ignorant" with "stupid."

He is very angry, apparently because he could get no one here to agree with him. Weird.
 

Boy, you done went and gone confederate on me again!
ER said:
"One thought: The Civil War did not politically settle any of the issues that tore the country apart back then. Those questions were subdued, not settled, by force of arms, and by a national government that had the Southern state governments at its military mercy."
Amillion lives expended and nothing settled. You know better.
The Civil War is over. Nobody won much, but they won some. The Saudies and the Japanese, and the Chinese, own most of the South today. States' Rights have given way to Corporate Policies and we have sold our souls to the automobile. If Rem is living in 1805 (not such a bad year), you're living in 1861. You need to be a Re-inactor to purge youself and get this confederate stuff out of your current realities.

I read Mark's stuff today (this is Tuesday). I guess he missed my Brown Shirt comment. Does he know where you live?
 

Oh my word. I just read all this. It's simply amazing. Disgusting too, in major parts.

The only thing I'll comment on is Rem870's comment on Elders...

"Re Elders - As the youngest poster around here, maybe my memory can help you out. Yeah, her masturbation policy did go against the grain and that was probably (if not definitely) the thing that got her canned."

Yeah, well, if her masturbation policy went against the grain, she should have been canned. I hate it when that happens.

(HAHAHAHAHA it's a joke, people.)