A voice of reason from the left of center

I never claimed it was "objectionable". The state taking funds from the people and using them to fund state operated "entities" is indeed socialism.

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I can begrudgingly go along with this. It is not about the GI Bill or the Post Office though, this goes straight to the root question of taxation for any purpose. If taxation, then for what purpose? I like Ayn Rand's take on this subject:

“The only proper purpose of a government is to protect a man’s rights, which means: to protect him from physical violence.” “The only proper functions of a government are: the police, to protect you from criminals; the army, to protect you from foreign invaders, and the courts, to protect your property and contracts from breach or fraud by others, to settle disputes by rational rules, according to objective law.” Atlas Shrugged–pg. 973

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I only objected to the GI Bill being compared to social programs like welfare. Serving in the military for 4 years (and voluntarily giving up all your freedom, maybe your life) isn't nearly the same as a "social program". Socialism....the same as taking taxes for any purpose, sure, I guess. Every society needs some form of "socialism" or there is no society, just folks livin' near each other, doin' what they please...hopefully nobody conquers them and makes them slaves.

I'll trade getting rid of the GI Bill for getting rid of welfare! And I'll raise you a gas tax (as in ditch it) if someone antes up with losing the "death tax".

Playboypenguin,

Personally, I have travelled a bit, mostly in this country however, which you apparently, have not.

I don't care what you say about statistics, or your friend's mom the auditor.

Take a trip down to Birmingham, Alabama. Go to a place called Ensley. Live there for a couple of years. Then come back here and tell me that social programs are nothing more than a safety net for poor single moms while they get their education.

I would tell you to go the Brickyard specifically, but I was recently informed by our friend Ala Dan that that pit of depravity and human blight has been scourged from this world. Thank God.

Statistics lie. With my own eyes I've seen thousands of people living off of the dole. The light of all human ambition crushed from their bodies. Brains turned to mush. Laying on the couch watching the soaps. I've seen it in the projects, and I've seen it in trailer parks, and I've seen it in places with roaches on the wall so thick that when you first walk in you think its a wall paper pattern. Then it moves.

Since the Brickyard is gone, go to any inner-city, anywhere in the country. Live there. Work there. Work with the people. Work with the baby mommas. Then come back here with your liberal self-righteousness and tell me that I'm only imagining these things because of talk radio.

(on a side note, I can't stand O'Reilly or Hannity or Rush)

The sad part? These people have everything handed to them on a silver plate. I've been in homes with big screen TVs, air conditioning, and crack vials smashed into the carpet, while kids from seven different fathers scrambled through the house. The oldest at twelve, already pregnant.

Social handouts destroy people. They destroy entire generations of people. If you're given a net at every fall, then you quit trying to stand.

If programs worked like you imagine they work, then we wouldn't be having this conversation. However they don't.

I will, for the purpose of argument, concede that social programs do good.

Now, please show that that money does not cause the government to become too powerful.

Also, explain how the good intentions of charity makes it right for steal money from one to give to another.

Is it because it does good? Well, it would do me good to have half of your money. PM me for the mailing address. Money order will be fine, thanks. Oh, wait, doing good is not sufficient reason? I guess I misunderstood.

Or is it because a group of people voted on it? Well, then, I will arrange a large group of people to vote on taking your money and give it to another. Again, money order will be fine, thanks. What, you object? I can't just pick a group of people to have a vote?

Will it be sufficient if I get, say, 20% of the country to vote on taking half of your money and give it to me? Would that, then, be right, where all these other takings I have described are wrong? Why not? 20% is more than go to the polls some days.

What if everyone votes to take half of your money and give it to me? Can't argue that nobody had a choice.

As far as I can tell, the prevailing idea is that thievery is wrong unless you get a large enough group of thieves, and then it's alright. Or did I misunderstand something along the way?

As far as I can tell, the prevailing idea is that thievery is wrong unless you get a large enough group of thieves, and then it's alright. Or did I misunderstand something along the way

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You did not misunderstand.

The basic tenet of liberalism/socialism/progressives is that theft is fine and even noble as long as your heart is in the right place. Or you think your heart is in the right place. Or you can get enough congress critters to vote that your heart is in the right place.

Liberals believe that any property belonging to someone else is fair game for confiscation as long as you think it might "help" someone other than the person whose property is taken.

The republic will remain secure until the goverment realizes they can bribe people with their own money. :banghead:

I have always said people on goverment assistance should not be allowed to vote. Then the poloticians would not need to cater to them and it could be made into a true safety net.

My mother worked multiple jobs her whole life then received food stamps for 2 years while she quit one of her jobs to attend nursing school. because of that program she could still feed her kids and get an education to get a good paying and beneficial job.

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She quit a job voluntarily, and _I_ am supposed to feed the kids? I don't know you, her, or them. While _she_ was taking taxpayer money at gunpoint (by proxy) to feed her kids, and while voluntarily not working when she could, _I_ was working _and_ getting an education at my own expense - _and_ having my money confiscated to support her when she was entirely capable of providing for herself and her own. Fair? No.

And yes, NY offered to give me taxpayer-confiscated money to pay for my education at one point.
I declined the offer. I couldn't stomach stealing money from others.
My education was the fruit of my own labors (save a voluntary gift from my parents).

I can appreciate the concept of a gov't-provided safety net for those who truly are unable to care for themselves and get no help from others, those who literally will suffer and die for lack of aid.
Bluntly, your mother wasn't one of them.

I want my money back. I have my own family to support.
Thanks to confiscatory taxes, most of which go to people capable of working, I won't have enough money to pay my bills this month. Thanks loads.

Imagine that welfare just disappeared today. what do you think would happen?

would taxes actually be lowered?

more importanly, what would happen to the PEOPLE who needed it?

could you rest comfortbaly knowing that people in AMERICA were sturggling even more?

but most of them are good hard working people who just have no oppotinities any longer.

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Been there, done that.

I've moved my family in the back of my van when the local economy couldn't support us. I've held jobs in at least two dozen fields. I never asked for or expected anyone else to feed me or my family - no matter what the circumstances. From the time I left home (legally emancipated at 16) I have never asked nor expected anyone to cover my a$$ or my debts for me.

Expecting individual circumstances to be externalized to the community for resolution is exactly what's wrong with your view of social assistance, and (trying to get relevant content here) exactly why the RKBA and Government-sponsored social liberalism are mutually incompatible mindsets. Oh, I'm a social liberal, all right. I just don't want my Government to be responsible for it. I can't stomach the idea of spending someone else's money when they really didn't want to give it to me.

Pity that sense of morality is in short supply.

PPenguin, Go to another country that has no welfare, like Switzerland, see the people work? See the people smile? See the low taxes? How about this country after WW II? We had little or no welfare, people didn't look to government to feed and care for them, they did it themselves out of self respect and an independant attitude. Welfare, the dole, aid, call it what you want it is like wearing a brace on your leg; if your leg is broken wear it for six weeks and then take it off and your leg works pretty well and gradually regains its strength and is able to support you. Wear that brace for a couple of years and your leg becomes a worthless appendage to your body just as welfare recipients become worthless appendages to society.

To blame asssistance programs for the decay of inner cities is ignorance at best...at worst it is willfull dishonesty.

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Wrong. Section 8 housing has utterly devastated the West Side of Manchester, here. Where it was once, apparently, a close-knit European ethnic community of proud rowhouses well-kept with low crime, that whole are is now drive-by and stabbing central.

PRECISELY because of Section 8. You see, there's a lot of absentee landlords who are so happy to suck up to the government for the juicy subsidies that they can declare a ridiculous rent on the now-trashed rowhouses broken up into apartments..and the goverment gives it to them, the renter only paying like $200 of it. They don't care who they rent to...transients, ex-felons, illegals, anything.

As a result, the West Side has quickly become an area you don't go into after dark, and the remaining older residents live in terror with now-unsaleable homes.

Elsewhere, where the government has MANDATED that apartment complexes must have some Section 8 units, it's been just as bad, if not worse. A complex in Nashua, once nice, now has 3am police visits, and people bringing their 40-member extended family to the pool. One in downtown Nashua, Clocktower Place, which would otherwise be $1300+ units, was forced to have a number of Section 8 units. The result was stolen laundry from laundry rooms, garbage in the halls, vandalized cars in the garage, blaring salsa music... you get the picture.

So don't say it doesn't have an effect.

It was misguided assistance and "diversity". See, to me, diversity means people are all different colors and backgrounds. That's good. My place is diversified, but they're all successful professionals. But when you throw people who failed or who just don't know how to live into an upscale complex, they bring their problems with them, and punish the people who DID succeed well enough to live there at full rental rates. They don't suddenly become upstanding, successful citizens, doctors and lawyers when you empty the projects into an upscale rental community. It just punishes people who did better.

As one homeowner outside Manchester even said, "We worked hard to escape the ghetto. We didn't expect it to follow us."

Just to let you know, since you mentioned Alabama and what you saw there, I was stationed at Redstone Arsenal for 3years in Alabama. I lived there and you are wrong about most of the people there. Maybe the color of their skin influenced your perception but most of them are good hard working people who just have no oppotinities any longer.

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Oh, that's rich. So now I'm a rascist. Influenced by the color of their skin? Interesting how if you disagree with a liberal about social programs, you are automatically rascist. We made it to page 3 before you played the race card, so that's a new record.

You have no clue who I am, or what I was doing in Ensley. (and btw, Huntsville isn't even close to Birmingham in any way when it comes to poverty).

I didn't visit there. I LIVED THERE.

And race has nothing to do with it. Go to Corinth or Booneville or Decater or any other place in driving distance from Redstone Arsenal. Find a decaying trailer park, and you'll find the same exact thing. People destroyed by living entangled in your benevolent safety net. Color's different, people are the same.

To blame asssistance programs for the decay of inner cities is ignorance at best...at worst it is willfull dishonesty.

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So I'm a dishonest, ignorant, rascist. Remarkable. Yesterday I was an authoritarian statist neocon cowboy.

Alot of the people in those places are older people who worked all their lives then once they were used up were tossed aside with no pension or retirement. Alot of the others are the product of an economy that does not provide oppotunities to people who come from lower classes the way it ised to do.

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Horse crap. "Alot" of those people?

I came from a lower class. My class was about as low as you can get. Maybe that's why I'm a heartless bastard, but I'm fresh out of pity.

We have more opportunities than we know what to do with. You've travelled the world. Our poorest people in America would be considered rich anywhere else. This is the land of opportunity.

Government doesn't create opportunity. It destroys opportunity.

Alot of the problems you mentioned have more to do with America's current "wal-mart mentaility" than it does with any assistance programs. Inner cities decline over time because their revenue source falls away after being unable to compete with foreign products, big box stores, etc...then the area becomes impoverished and with poverty comes crime...it is a domino affect.

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Huh?

Is it some sort of doctrine for people like you to bring fricking Wal-Mart into every discusssion? I despise Wal-Mart, but they have about as much to do with poverty and social programs as the Muppets have to the space program.

Don't you get it? In government subsidized projects and inner-cities the revenue source is the government! That is it. That is all! That's all you do. You suck on a teat all day.

Dannyboy, just what exactly is your definition of socialism?

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Here's one: 1 : any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods

You said that people being employed by the government is socialism because they are compensated from taxes. Never mind the fact that the gov't. is way too big but do you think people should work for the gov't for free? Maybe we should just do away with government all together?

You said that people being employed by the government is socialism because they are compensated from taxes. Never mind the fact that the gov't. is way too big but do you think people should work for the gov't for free? Maybe we should just do away with government all together?

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None of that has anything to do with the definition of socialism. Again, workers in the Soviet Union were compensated. Government agencies are by their very nature socialism. Compensation has nothing to do with whether or not something is socialism.

My point is that going around saying "socialism is bad, m-k?" is pointless; there are some socialistic aspects of government that all but the very fringe of society would agree are good things.

Correia and Manedwolf are pointing out how some socialist programs miss the mark, and do not do what they were intended to do. Fantastic. Whether or not I agree with all of their viewpoints isn't the issue, what is the issue is they are saying "this social program has failed due to this information", rather than just repeating "it's socialism, so it's gotta be bad".

It's kind of like the thread on the revolutionaries/rebels/whatever in Mexico. Someone said, basically, "they aren't our friends, their Marxist!". Hmm, ever think that they turned to Marxism because they live under a horribly corrupt capitalistic society? Corruption is not our friend either folks.

I think under-educated poor people on the wrong end of a corrupt capitalistic stick naturally migrate to Marxism. It promises a lot, delivers very little. Look, I'm a strong proponent of capitalism, and not just because I get all teary-eyed and patriotic and want to believe that "we have the best system in the world, thank G-d for ma and applie pie". That's as much hogwash as those poor folks suckered in to the Marxist lines because "we'll have the best system in the world". My belief in capitalism comes from a couple of years of studying economics at a graduate level. It seems to be the best solution to most problems, if properly performed.

Some problems, like post offices and national defense, are best solved through socialist means. Sorry if that is a bad word to you, but it's just how it is.

Yeah, I'm confused on that too, Keith. I'm not sure how military service and paying government employees turned into socialism, since both of those existed for thousands of years before Karl Marx was born.

Having a governement doesn't equal socialism.
Having a government with paid employees doesn't equal socialism.
Paying your military doesn't equal socialism.

I don't even see how amongst educated adults this can be a point of contention.

Beyond that, what do I know, I'm just a BIGOT!!!!! (if only PlayboyPenguin had a clue he would know why that was especially ironic).

Socialism is using government as a means of redistributing wealth, just because redistributing wealth by hiring soldiers was going on before Marx doesn't make it any less socialistic.

People used money long before Adam Smith wrote "on the wealth of nations", doesn't make ancient Roman coins any less capitalistic.

My contention is defining socialism as "any government means of redistributing wealth that I don't agree with".

Keith, for the sake of discussion, we should probably keep Socialism with a capital S the good old Marxian one we're used to. Otherwise there could never be any discussion of government ever unless it was Randian Super Libertarianism vs. Everything Else.

On your last point, I agree with you. It makes us look dumb if everything we disagree with is called a commie.

As for capitalism and Adam Smith, I'm an accountant by education. I believe that capitalism isn't a way of life, it is a fundamental law of the universe. It doesn't matter if you choose it, recognize it, believe in it, it is going to exist. Kind of like gravity.

By the way, PlayboyPenguin hasn't been back to this thread since he pretty much called me a rascist. Bummer. I was curious to see what came out of the playbook after the race card.

On your last point, I agree with you. It makes us look dumb if everything we disagree with is called a commie.

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Or if we quickly dismiss anyone who has a Marxist leaning philosophy.

I'm not sure I'd agree that capitalism is as fundamental as gravity, since it is so linked to human behavior, but that said Marxists tend to be people with either insufficient information, incorrect assumptions, or both. By dismissing them (like some would the Marxist revolutionaries gathering in Mexico) we dismiss a chance to educate, and to me, a chance to improve things.

Because people that love to bitch about these so called "give away" programs usually have no understanding of what they have actually accomplished and how much they do for the greater good of the country. After you have lived elsewhere were such programs do not exist you start to realize tha,t despite the small percentage of people that abuse the system, these programs have helped the coutry greatly. Imagine a country were disease ran rampant because of no social health care system, where interior infastructure was private built and owned and not accessable to the general public, where no public school system existed so the majority of people were uneducated, where no unemployemt compensation existed so more people were unemployed and starving. These places do exist and if you have not experienced them I suggest you get down and thank your lucky stars that you have not had to experience them before you open your yap and complain about something of which you know nothing besides the sound bites you have heard on conservative talk radio from some drug addict..

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Sorry, this is probably off topic, but I can't let this utter BS slide by.

I've been there too, and trust me, it isn't the presence of social give away programs that makes these places the miserable hell-holes that they are. It's the absence of free market capitalism, and the corresponding national prosperity capitalism brings, that cause the misery and suffering you referr to.

Look at the Soviet Union. If ever there was a great social give away nation, this was it. But did it improve anyones' lives there? Nope. Did the Soviet Union look any more pleasant or appealing than your average undeveloped third-world slum nation? Nope. The obvious lesson is that social giveaways do not do a darned thing to improve the standard of living.

Look at the United Nations giveaways, the World Bank giveaways, the international foreign aid giveaways. Look at the countries that have received all of this give away wealth. Do any of the recipient countries look like someplace we'd prefer over the US or Europe? Nope. The undeniable truth is that social giveaways do nothing to elevate the standard of living.

It is the prosperity enjoyed by most of the Western nations that allows them to indulge in these welfare programs, not the other way around. If the thrid world nations want to enjoy the prosperity and standard of living we have, then they have to earn it just like we did. They must create a government ruled the law, justice, equality, and liberty, and they must allow the individual to persue his own best interests however he sees fit.

EDIT: Hmm, maybe it wasn't off topic afterall...

"All drug addicts are bad except for me" Rush

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I'm sorry, when did he say that? Rush is no hypocrite on the drug issue.

This thread reminds me how much I really, really like the "ignore" feature on this board.

hillbilly

Imagine that welfare just disappeared today. what do you think would happen?

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Everything that would have happened without it, multiplied, in a very short time.

The welfare system WILL disappear at some point. The system can't continue this way. Short of major reform, which MUST happen, and WILL NOT happen due to political cost, it WILL collapse.

Instead of letting the natural stresses relieve themselves appropriately, it's all pent up and compounding. We can't continue this way, and we can't easily deal with it when it finally breaks.

would taxes actually be lowered?

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Yes. People would need that money back so they can support their citizens the correct way - by hiring them. If not for taxes, I'd hire a live-in housekeeper. For taxes, much more than that cost is confiscated at implied gunpoint, and that would-be housekeeper is on welfare.

more importanly, what would happen to the PEOPLE who needed it?

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NEED? they NEED a job. I can't hire 'em with HALF my income being confiscated. I'll give 'em a job - just let me keep my money so I can hire 'em.

could you rest comfortbaly knowing that people in AMERICA were sturggling even more?

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Misguided & loaded question. I am struggling because the govenrment is taking HALF MY INCOME and giving it to people who don't contribute. Better I far more efficiently hire them to do work directly.

That "but they're struggling" perversion resulted in the Great Depression lasting 10 times longer than it would have.

Get out of my wallet. Because of your attitude, I might not be able to make a property tax payment and could lose my house. Perverse, isn't it? losing a home because I can't pay a tax because too much of my income is being confiscated in taxes? Thanks loads.

OK - first of all, is it socialism, Pengiun, when a private company provides tuition assitance? The GI bill requires not only service in the military, but I also had to pay $1200 to get it. Any Marine that didn't make that payment, didn't get the benefit. Your position that its socialist is tenuous at best.

And, why do you equate charity with taxation and redistribution? Charity, my friend, isn't charity when its confiscated. Your arrogance surrounding supporting those government programs as charity is as disingenuine as it is misguided. Government welfare isn't about charity, its about politics and bureaucracy.

And, I think your comment insinuating Correia is a racist is totally out of bounds. Why do leftists look at people and see the color of their skin? You made that comment because that is how you see the world, and think everyone else sees in with that taint. It reflects much more upon your psyche than is does those you paint with it.


I spent a year in Cuba watching people risk their lives trying to escape. Cuba, if nowhere else, is one of the last countries everyone is given all the needs life demands. Instead of the world flocking to it, its citizens flee. Some die in that process, either by the ocean, or at the hands of its army. I've seen it happen firsthand. Ironic how those people would rather flee that utopia, and risk death, in favor of nothing more than freedom and opportunity, isn't it?