Death Penalty

[GasBandit]

Don't blame politicians the point of capitalism is companies regulate themselves. Deregulation isn't a scapegoat it is a bullshit excuse. The people who did this shit were dickheads and the ones that bet short against the stuff they knew were turds are the biggest dicks. I support capitalism but it's people like these that make it impossible to ever exist by good faith.

That would be the point of pure capitalism... something we've not had, ever. I'm not an anarcho-capitalist. There is a role for government, but mandating that banks must give mortgages to people who make 20k a year and make it look profitable on paper isn't that.

If you think the American Public is gonna turn off American Idol long enough to overthrow the government and start a new state, you are deranged.

That's not what will cause the breakup. The Soviet Union shattered without a shot being fired, after all. I believe that the balkanization of the US will come about through a complete collapse of the federal government due to insanely-in-denial fiscal policy. Republicans spend, Democrats spend faster, and those are our only choices it seems. Eventually something's gotta give, and when it does and the federal gravy train dries up and blows away, where people look for government will also change. First they'll look to their local governments, their City Halls and Councils, to deal with immediate problems such as crime, looting and safety... and naturally, when immediate problems are under control and they start worrying about things like food and trade, governments of communities near each other will attempt to cooperate to better serve the needs of their people, and they may even be able to maintain communication and logistics for the state governments in some cases. But the contiguous "United States" will cease to exist as people fill the vacuum by creating associations with those who are most like themselves and most accessible.

We won't overthrow our government, it's undermining itself. One day, within our lifetime, the sinkhole will open up underneath it and swallow it. Then when interstate commerce is disrupted, we'll see how long "american idol" stays on the air to keep the proles distracted and sedentary. Things will get very nasty for a while, and a lot of people will suffer and die, and eventually multiple disparate nations will emerge from the ashes.

 

[Chazwozel]

Don't blame politicians the point of capitalism is companies regulate themselves. Deregulation isn't a scapegoat it is a bullshit excuse. The people who did this shit were dickheads and the ones that bet short against the stuff they knew were turds are the biggest dicks. I support capitalism but it's people like these that make it impossible to ever exist by good faith.

That would be the point of pure capitalism... something we've not had, ever. I'm not an anarcho-capitalist. There is a role for government, but mandating that banks must give mortgages to people who make 20k a year and make it look profitable on paper isn't that.

If you think the American Public is gonna turn off American Idol long enough to overthrow the government and start a new state, you are deranged.

That's not what will cause the breakup. The Soviet Union shattered without a shot being fired, after all. I believe that the balkanization of the US will come about through a complete collapse of the federal government due to insanely-in-denial fiscal policy. Republicans spend, Democrats spend faster, and those are our only choices it seems. Eventually something's gotta give, and when it does and the federal gravy train dries up and blows away, where people look for government will also change. First they'll look to their local governments, their City Halls and Councils, to deal with immediate problems such as crime, looting and safety... and naturally, when immediate problems are under control and they start worrying about things like food and trade, governments of communities near each other will attempt to cooperate to better serve the needs of their people, and they may even be able to maintain communication and logistics for the state governments in some cases. But the contiguous "United States" will cease to exist as people fill the vacuum by creating associations with those who are most like themselves and most accessible.

We won't overthrow our government, it's undermining itself. One day, within our lifetime, the sinkhole will open up underneath it and swallow it. Then when interstate commerce is disrupted, we'll see how long "american idol" stays on the air to keep the proles distracted and sedentary. Things will get very nasty for a while, and a lot of people will suffer and die, and eventually multiple disparate nations will emerge from the ashes.[/QUOTE]

.


Oh and on the collapse of the Soviet Union I didn't feel like writing up much so I'll just cut and paste the initial steps from the wiki article.

Late at night on January 19, 1990, 26,000 Soviet troops stormed Baku in order to crush the Popular Front. In the course of the storming, the troops attacked the protesters, firing in the crowds. The shooting continued for three days. They acted pursuant to a state of emergency (which continued for more than 4 months) declared by the USSR Supreme Soviet Presidium, signed by President Gorbachev. The state of emergency was, however, only disclosed to the Azerbaijani public hours after the beginning of the storming,when many citizens already lay wounded or dead in the streets, hospitals and morgues of Baku. According to official data, between 133 and 137people died with unofficial numbers reaching 300. Up to 800 were injured and 5 went missing.An additional 26 people were killed in Neftchala and Lankaran regions of the country. The Soviet army soldiers used 5.45 mm caliber bullets with a shifted center of gravity designed to shear after entering the body thus causing an excessive physical damage to the body.

On January 13, 1991, Soviet troops, along with KGB Spetsnaz Alpha Group, stormed the Vilnius TV Tower in Vilnius, Lithuania to suppress the nationalist media. This ended with 14 unarmed civilians dead and hundreds more injured. Later that month in Georgian SSR, anti-Soviet protesters at Tbilisi demonstrated support for Lithuanian independence

I want to know. What does it feel like to be completely ignorant about a topic, make up half-truths, and proclaim them as fact? That must be an awesome feeling.

Oh wait, I found a perfect description of the Libertarian mindset:

 

[GasBandit]

No, what's batshit crazy is how we think we can keep spending more and more and more without consequences.

If there had been an internet in 1990, and I'd told you the Soviet union was just going to fall apart and break up on its own in a year, you probably would have posted that same image.

 

[Necronic]

No, what's batshit crazy is how we think we can keep spending more and more and more without consequences.

That I definitely can't disagree with, the federal deficit is getting out of hand. The only silver lining there is that it is getting out of hand in almost every other first world country, with a couple of exceptions (Australia, Switzerland China if you count that as 1st world)

The question is where do you cut spending? To get things back on track, here's one thought. Abolish the death penalty, as it costs more.

 

[Chazwozel]

If there had been an internet in 1990, and I'd told you the Soviet union was just going to fall apart and break up on its own in a year, you probably would have posted that same image.

Ah specious reasoning, how I love thee.

 

[Espy]

No, what's batshit crazy is how we think we can keep spending more and more and more without consequences.

That I definitely can't disagree with, the federal deficit is getting out of hand. The only silver lining there is that it is getting out of hand in almost every other first world country, with a couple of exceptions (Australia, Switzerland China if you count that as 1st world)

The question is where do you cut spending? To get things back on track, here's one thought. Abolish the death penalty, as it costs more.[/QUOTE]

Man, I don't think the question is so much "but what on earth can we cut????" but rather, "Where the hell do we start, there are so many obvious options!"

 

[Charlie Don't Surf]

#1 we should abolish the death penalty we are imposing on Iraq and Afghanistan

 

[Espy]

You know how sometimes people say things that you agree with but they wrap it up in crazy so you don't want to say you agree with them?

 

[Charlie Don't Surf]

You know how sometimes people say things that you agree with but they wrap it up in crazy so you don't want to say you agree with them?

More innocents have been killed in the last ~10 years of afghanistan and/or iraq than by the death penalty ever in the US. And a whatever stupid tiger $200m missle costs more than death penalty appeals.

 

[Rob King]

#1 we should abolish the death penalty we are imposing on Iraq and Afghanistan

Cute.

Actually, I didn't realize how much opposition there was to the war in Afghanistan until very recently. I don't understand it, to be honest. Iraq, sure, I can get how we don't like that one. But in Afghanistan there was a just cause for invasion, the permission of the UN and the obligation of NATO, and on top of that a request from the legitimate government of Afghanistan.

 

[crono1224]

You know how sometimes people say things that you agree with but they wrap it up in crazy so you don't want to say you agree with them?

More innocents have been killed in the last ~10 years of afghanistan and/or iraq than by the death penalty ever in the US. And a whatever stupid tiger $200m missle costs more than death penalty appeals.[/QUOTE]

Ya good luck pulling out of Afghanistan, people would shit on which ever president does that (Obama or the next, which it will no doubt take that long). It would be nice to find out that in how many years we been there we haven't done a whole lot lately and never got the one guy we were suppose to get in the first place.

 

[Charlie Don't Surf]

We have done a whole lot of wasting taxpayer money. Support are troooooooooops

 

[Rob King]

We have done a whole lot of wasting taxpayer money. Support are troooooooooops

If you can't support your own army and/or the government who got you in a wholly justified war, how about supporting the citizens of Afghanistan who have not a chance at a free or just future if the ISAF were to leave tomorrow.

 

[Necronic]

I don't know how many of them are all that obvious though.

Do you cut military spending? We're already doing that with our withdrawal and it will probably turn Iraq into one of the most dangerous places in the world. Should we continue to cut it? Who will step into the breach? China? Russia?

Do you cut Medicare/Medicade spending? Considering that they are both already about to collapse, doing this would probably kill them, and doing that alongside the healthcare overhaul is just stupid.

Well what about wellfare and unemployment? Even assuming you could find enough suicidal politicians to push something like that forward to completion (which is different than the posturing going on right now,) what are the other costs you would get? The housing market would continue to crumble as people would no longer be able to make their rents or mortgages, which would have a ripple effect across the economy.

Then what about increasing taxes? Well, where are you going to increase them? On those big greedy corporations? Ok, then feel free to just dump every penny you earned and then some into unemployment and welfare because those companies will leave the United States. Increasing it on the middle class and wealthy may not be a bad idea, IF you increase it only a slight amount AND you only do it temporarilly. However that could just hurt consumer spending.

Education? Seriously? Cutting education (something Obama is pushing) is probably one of the dumbest ideas out there, dumber than most of the others. The only thing that allows Americans the standard of living we have today is that our best are better educated and have better access to technowledgy (why can I never spell that right) than any other country in the world. Our worst are generally worse than most 1st world countries, and that is something we need to improve. The lack of good education is one of the few things keeping China from becoming the truly dominant superpower in the world.

-------

It's hard to find places to save money right now, because the economy is so completely fubared. We should have been more intelligent about how the stipend money went out though:

Small business loans, something considered to be very important to the stabilization of the economy, accounted for less than 1 billion of the stimulus (636 mil), really only enough to help out a small handful of businesses, while on the other hand, Special Education for people with disabilities recieved a whopping 12 billion dollars. While I am a strong supporter of special education (and it is something I am proud that American's deal with better than almost any other country), this spending had no place in the stimulus package, at least not at that amount.

With all the talk about green green green, advanced battery manufacturing only recieved 2 billion dollars, not much considering, and the beauty is that we have only JUST started to build the plants. Of course that's nothing compared to the fact that Science and Technology only recieved 13 bil or so (some of it does fall into energy, so maybe 30 is a better number) and of that pretty much 1/2 of it was put into the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, which is actually an infrastructure group.

Most of the funding put into the Stimulus package was just a stopgap to fill funding holes in the existing budget, which means that a lot of it ended up going right back into funding the bureacracy, which is ridiculous. The purpose of it should have been to see more money going into private industry, and really very little of it did. This stimulus was executed incredibly poorly, but what's done is done.

 

[Chazwozel]

Education? Seriously? Cutting education (something Obama is pushing) is probably one of the dumbest ideas out there, dumber than most of the others. The only thing that allows Americans the standard of living we have today is that our best are better educated and have better access to technowledgy (why can I never spell that right) than any other country in the world. Our worst are generally worse than most 1st world countries, and that is something we need to improve. The lack of good education is one of the few things keeping China from becoming the truly dominant superpower in the world.

Uh, Obama is most certainly pushing to reform the completely broken and fucked up Bush era No Child Left Behind act of 2001. Obama: Overhaul The cuts would be in the areas of over excessive use of high-stakes testing since schools wouldn't have the yearly reports to deal with.

And, for the first time in 45 years, the White House is proposing a $4 billion increase in federal education spending, most of which would go to increase the competition among states for grant money and move away from formula-based funding.

This is a smart move in the right direction to fix a broken system. High-stakes testing alone is not an education. It's kids being taught to learn how to take a test, so the school doesn't get budget cuts. Obama is actively pushing a deep learning agenda mixed with high-stakes testing.

Really the only direction to go after the No Child Left Behind act of 2001 is up. The ONLY part of that legislature that was good were the standards for "qualified" teachers. Even in that case though, instead of helping close the achievement gap among students, it helped to widen it since rural and inner city schools can't keep good teachers.

 

[GasBandit]

We have done a whole lot of wasting taxpayer money. Support are troooooooooops

Again, we've spent less on Iraq and Afghanistan combined than we have in slushing political allies and calling it "stimulus," all the while making the economy worse than had government done nothing at all.

 

[Necronic]

Good correction Chaz, I was being a bit flippant. However he has held some strange stances, on the one hand pushing the Race to the Top agenda, and on the other cutting funding that is desperately needed to keep from laying off teachers. The worst part of the latter is that it is focused around the 'last in first out' policy, where new teachers are the first to be laid off. This is a serious problem because it maintains a status-quo that is not performance driven (aka a union) which goes against pretty much everything in the Race to the Top initiative.

 

[Chazwozel]

Good correction Chaz, I was being a bit flippant. However he has held some strange stances, on the one hand pushing the Race to the Top agenda, and on the other cutting funding that is desperately needed to keep from laying off teachers. The worst part of the latter is that it is focused around the 'last in first out' policy, where new teachers are the first to be laid off. This is a serious problem because it maintains a status-quo that is not performance driven (aka a union) which goes against pretty much everything in the Race to the Top initiative.

My stance on the entire issue is that the Federal Government should give states and local districts funding and then shut the fuck up about how it's spent. Let the state direct it. That's how No Child Left Behind is supposed to work. Then again, it's a wonder that the Fed even helps schools out at all considering there is absolutely nothing in the constitution about education.

 

[GasBandit]

Good correction Chaz, I was being a bit flippant. However he has held some strange stances, on the one hand pushing the Race to the Top agenda, and on the other cutting funding that is desperately needed to keep from laying off teachers. The worst part of the latter is that it is focused around the 'last in first out' policy, where new teachers are the first to be laid off. This is a serious problem because it maintains a status-quo that is not performance driven (aka a union) which goes against pretty much everything in the Race to the Top initiative.

My stance on the entire issue is that the Federal Government should give states and local districts funding and then shut the fuck up about how it's spent. Let the state direct it. That's how No Child Left Behind is supposed to work. Then again, it's a wonder that the Fed even helps schools out at all considering there is absolutely nothing in the constitution about education.[/QUOTE]

That'd be workable I suppose. NCLB was a travesty. If the federal government is to fund education, making the state/local governments decide how it gets spent is better than it being planned centrally from Washington by leaps and bounds.

 

[Troll]

As a teacher, there are few things I hate more than NCLB. What a stupid fucking law. I get so sick of seeing colleagues completely abandon the idea of teaching in favor of "prepping" the students for the test (which really boils down to giving them as many answers ahead of time as possible).

 

[Chibibar]

As a teacher, there are few things I hate more than NCLB. What a stupid fucking law. I get so sick of seeing colleagues completely abandon the idea of teaching in favor of "prepping" the students for the test (which really boils down to giving them as many answers ahead of time as possible).

many of my friends who are teachers agree with you. It is so sad to see student only know how to "answer the test" and don't really critically think anymore

 

[Hailey Knight]

Dumb them down, it makes them easier to [strike]control[/strike] lead.

 

[Chazwozel]

Dumb them down, it makes them easier to [strike]control[/strike] lead.

No, that has nothing to do with it. The reason the high stakes testing methods were implemented was because testing is a quantifiable thing to rate schools on. You can't measure deep learning and critical thinking ability as cheaply and quickly as you can with standardized tests.

The whole NCLB act is based on dumbing down the system so that the slower kids can catch up with the brighter ones and close the "achievement gap" i.e. inner city students doing much more poorly in school vs. suburban kids. The problem is and always will be economic status. Suburban kids have access to better resources than inner city kids and those in poverty. Period. It's a quick fix on a much deeper problem. The only thing it's succeeded in is taking really bright and motivated students and holding them back.

All NCLB has done is driven away good teachers from bad schools because those schools cannot afford them and because someone with high qualifications usually has the option to go to a nicer area. Unless you're out on a mission to help inner city kids, why would you risk getting shanked by one and deal with the headaches of low pay, tons more work, and hardly any perks?

The problem isn't going to be fixed with schools. The problem boils down to poverty and the lowest rung of the middle class. Really the only solution would be to ship kids off and mix them up in public boarding schools where they're all on fixed, equal ground to receive an education. I mean let's get that straight right off the bat. The whole point of education in America is to level the playing field so that everyone is educated and on the same footing when they start to compete against one another for work.

And I don't want to hear any of that pull yourself by the bootstraps garbage because it's probably the stupidest ideal ever imagined. You can't expect the achievement gap to be closed when one side of it has access to endless educational resources while the other side is lucky if they have the power bill paid off.

Now, you're a little bit right in terms of another aspect of school systems purpose. Back in the day the public school system was specifically designed around promoting an American culture. This is why we have shit like the pledge of allegiance, but that doesn't mean the government (or the founding fathers) ever wanted dumb citizens. Dumb citizens can't compete in today's market, at all.

---------- Post added at 10:21 PM ---------- Previous post was at 10:17 PM ----------

As a teacher, there are few things I hate more than NCLB. What a stupid fucking law. I get so sick of seeing colleagues completely abandon the idea of teaching in favor of "prepping" the students for the test (which really boils down to giving them as many answers ahead of time as possible).

What are you gonna do though? If the school gets bad reports, you get cuts in funding.

 

[Troll]

As a teacher, there are few things I hate more than NCLB. What a stupid fucking law. I get so sick of seeing colleagues completely abandon the idea of teaching in favor of "prepping" the students for the test (which really boils down to giving them as many answers ahead of time as possible).

What are you gonna do though? If the school gets bad reports, you get cuts in funding.[/QUOTE]

I look at it like this: either I did my job all year long, or I didn't. While teaching them properly, they should have learned what they need to know for the test anyway. If they didn't, then I fucked up. I'm not going to spend time focusing on the just the test to make up for shitty teaching the rest of the time.

 

[Necronic]

It's quite the sticky wicket. You need some sort of standardized assessment tool. This would allow us to judge the performance of teachers and schools and give merit based raises for teachers and help identify schools that need more assisstance. The problem is that almost any assessment tool you get is going to be either tainted by the biases of the principle or going to be heavily test oriented so that you can 'game' it, which is the problem here.

But you do need that tool. In Texas the problems aren't just with inner cities, it's also with the rural areas. Almost every one of those schools sucks. I think a lot of it has to do with the low pay.

 

[Chazwozel]

It's quite the sticky wicket. You need some sort of standardized assessment tool. This would allow us to judge the performance of teachers and schools and give merit based raises for teachers and help identify schools that need more assisstance. The problem is that almost any assessment tool you get is going to be either tainted by the biases of the principle or going to be heavily test oriented so that you can 'game' it, which is the problem here.

But you do need that tool. In Texas the problems aren't just with inner cities, it's also with the rural areas. Almost every one of those schools sucks. I think a lot of it has to do with the low pay.

Low pay and that highly qualified individuals are far and few in the boondocks of the world.

 

[Necronic]

True. The only way around that, as far as I can tell, is to have a federally mandated minimum salary for teachers, which would have to be subsidized by the federal government. So, let's say the minimum is 35k, you would still make more money in Houston, but if you taught in some boondock town the cost of living would be so low you would actually be making more. Problem is that those school districts are so poor that they couldn't afford that, hence it would have to be federally subsidized. Then of course you have problems with the school itself being underfunded, therefore supplies would be worse. Yet again you would need federal subsidies to deal with that. In both cases I think you could easily calculate the necessary subsidies based on some minimum acceptable taxation rate (property/income/whatever you pay for schools with in said state) and the number of students in a district. If there isn't X$ per student then you subsidize to reach that number.

Past that, and an inspector general type office to make sure there is no fraud going on in the distribution and expenditure of those subsidies, the federal government would be completely hands off.

Of course, there is also the argument that the rural school districts educate rural people to do rural stuff and who really cares? Basically they don't need a good education if they are going to stay out there. I don't really agree with that, but you could make that argument.

 

[Chazwozel]

Well public schools are unionized (I'm pretty sure they all are). Actually, no I'm not sure. Union membership with rural schools might be a factor. Maybe Troll knows something about that.

 

[Troll]

I'm in the suburbs, surrounded by big cities, so I'm not certain. The only rural teachers I've met are union, though, so I would guess all public schools are unionized regardless of their location/economic status.

 

[AshburnerX]

I'm in the suburbs, surrounded by big cities, so I'm not certain. The only rural teachers I've met are union, though, so I would guess all public schools are unionized regardless of their location/economic status.

Virtually all PUBLIC teachers are unionized. If you work at a private school, you probably aren't. That's the jist of it, according to my mother who's teaching special education right now.

 

[Chibibar]

True. The only way around that, as far as I can tell, is to have a federally mandated minimum salary for teachers, which would have to be subsidized by the federal government. So, let's say the minimum is 35k, you would still make more money in Houston, but if you taught in some boondock town the cost of living would be so low you would actually be making more. Problem is that those school districts are so poor that they couldn't afford that, hence it would have to be federally subsidized. Then of course you have problems with the school itself being underfunded, therefore supplies would be worse. Yet again you would need federal subsidies to deal with that. In both cases I think you could easily calculate the necessary subsidies based on some minimum acceptable taxation rate (property/income/whatever you pay for schools with in said state) and the number of students in a district. If there isn't X$ per student then you subsidize to reach that number.

Past that, and an inspector general type office to make sure there is no fraud going on in the distribution and expenditure of those subsidies, the federal government would be completely hands off.

Of course, there is also the argument that the rural school districts educate rural people to do rural stuff and who really cares? Basically they don't need a good education if they are going to stay out there. I don't really agree with that, but you could make that argument.

I kinda like the federal minimum wage for teachers. If we can subsidize sugar and stuff that is not really useful (bad for you ) we should shift that money for something with substance.

 

[Rob King]

Subsidizing sugar? Are you for real? I'm a dirty dirty socialist, and I think subsidizing sugar is ridiculous.

 

[AshburnerX]

Subsidizing sugar? Are you for real? I'm a dirty dirty socialist, and I think subsidizing sugar is ridiculous.

Besides, we don't subsidize sugar in the US. In fact we actually Tariff/tax it in order to protect the value of Corn. Corn's number one use in the US? High Fructose Corn Syrup, which is used as a sugar substitute here because it's cheaper to use this (inferior) concoction than natural sugar because of the tariff.

That's right: In order to make corn valuable again, we purposefully made the better substance more expensive to import, because nobody was buying as much corn as they used to. And with the recent lab reports claiming that HFCS may actually be harmful to us, it appears we may have been poisoning ourselves for years with this stuff in the name of supporting failing farms in the US. Go go Capitalism!

 

[Rob King]

For all the talk of it, you guys don't actually do the whole capitalism thing down there, do you?

 

[Troll]

For all the talk of it, you guys don't actually do the whole capitalism thing down there, do you?

That is not a debate I want to get into. Some people are rather testy about it.