"Man Survives Multiple burst Aneurysms" will be the headline. While everyone everywhere gets their licks on the hopefully huge story that Republican'ts in the House of Representatives squashed a Democratic attempt to vote on the COLA (Cost of Living Allowance/Allotment, whatEVARS) and then squashed an attempt to raise the Federal Minimum Wage (hereafter referred to as FMW) by 40%. For some reason, Dennis Hastert didn't want to have a debate on this issue until after the election. I can't imagine why.
The Republican'ts must have some awesome new PR campaign ready to shoot all over our faces because that is fucking crazy. Whatever anyone else may try to say about the Republican't party it is blatantly clear that they don't care about the little guy. I am sure that jackass cobags like Shootaliberal will claim that the FMW only stifles the free market while they are donning their Wendy's or Walmart uniforms, but will that thought keep them warm at night when fuel oil costs soar and the oil companies burn stacks of money in their fireplaces. Don't worry people, I am sure you got a really great interest rate on that Escalade. Too bad interest rates are on the rise, in part due to the global instability caused by the Bush administration's economic and foreign policy. I heard that Bush was going to make the Department of State a minor division in the Department of Defense, in order to hold down the deficit.
Does anyone remember what the deficit was before Bush took office?
The funny thing about the little guy is that these people actually exist, unlike the mythical self-made man. The only self-made man (or woman) would be someone that walked in out of the wilderness, self taught and thoroughly self socialized and then strolled right into Wall Street and made himself (or herself) a boatload of money and then started an empire. Otherwise, you aren't self-made. If you went to public school, you owe a lot to the government that provided the education and the environment to learn. (Although some might say that crappy urban schools require kids to find their own will to learn and education and I agree in part, but the school system is still public.) You also owe your community for providing you with the environment that shaped your personality and choices. This myth of the self-made person is just an excuse for people to ignore their obligation to their past and the public.
11 comments:
Good work Chuckles. This little article reeks of Da Troof, and avoids heady self-importance to boot!.
Yeah, I try to avoid all forms of self importance. Or something like that.
I've said it 100 times before -- poor, working class or even middle class republicans make NO sense. Yet, folks like Sean try to make a valid argument. He argues about saving $20 a check is super important when he cuts off folks on welfare or for other social programs like say, education. However, paying for your own healthcare, because corporations aren't going to do it much longer and we all know the republicans aren't going to make them and getting no student aid, or better yet, getting a livable wage or reducing the costs of secondary education are NOT worth it. That $20 is. It's not his fault. He needs the money, as do I. However, I know what the real cost over a lifetime is for voting Republican and $20 is not going to save me from that each week. In fact it will cost three times that a week and then some.
Yep.
Yeppers.
Anybody remember the Muppets that said, "Yep, Yep, Yep" all the time and ate nectarines?
For the longest time, I didn't want to eat nectarines because I thought they were from another planet and would take over my brain.
Muppets? No, AG watches grown up shows.
:)
I heard from the UC that when AG was five her favorite show was The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour.
Meanwhile, The Genius was busy wrestling his father for the remote to try and change the channel over to Buck Rogers.
When AG was five, her favorite shows were:
Magic Garden
and
Days of our Lives (Yep, Betty stayed home with AG, and since she couldn't get percs, we had to watch soaps).
Actually, this line is incorrect:
" If you went to public school, you owe a lot to the government that provided the education and the environment to learn."
One could debate the quality of the public school system (in my opinion, an educational system in which teachers are too busy keeping students from shooting each other rather than teaching isn't much of an educational system at all), but you ever-so-conveniently forget that we pay taxes to the government so in reality, the government OWES US a quality public school system. That's the big difference between what you call "Republicant's" and Dhimmicrats such as yourself: you believe that we're in debt to the government when in all honesty a government "by the people, for the people" is in debt to us.
Now we turn to your argument that the "self-made man" doesn't exist.
I could give you the complete sob story of my life; y'know, the whole living in a house that should've been condemned, the whole having to take a full-time job at the age of fifteen, quitting college to take care of my family, but I won't go into too much detail. With a little hard work and some elbow grease, I improved my life without welfare, without food stamps, and all the while paying twenty-five percent of my income to the federal government and the states of Missouri and Ohio. However, personal success doesn't matter to you people. As long as you can keep everyone beholden to the government and their bullshit social programs, you Dhimmicrats stay in power.
Also, AG, your argument is a load of crap. If Democrats really cared about the poor, working class, or middle class, the income tax would be done away with. It's not the government's responsibility to pay for healthcare, education, welfare, or whatever else you think the government should be responsible for. You should be your own responsibility, as I and my family are my own responsibility. My tax dollars shouldn't be going to lazy, unemployed women who use their food stamps to buy nothing but Mountain Dew and Little Debbie snack cakes. Now, of course you'll immediately retort by saying I don't care about supporting poor people and you would be correct. I don't care about supporting someone who would leech off my tax dollars when I am living proof that poverty can be defeated without government assistannce or aid.
You see, that's what we call a substantive argument, not an ad hominem attack. Let's see if you can respond in turn, or if you'll just post another hundred lines of "SeanS and Steve are cobags."
Steve, you don't even make me angry anymore. Your arguements just make me pity you.
Republican'ts don't work to give you anything. Sure, their tax breaks may give you $300 one year, but that same tax break gives $300,000 to the top 5% income earners in the country. Two questions for you Steve: How is that not welfare for those who don't need it? and how is that treating everyone the same?
Republican'ts will happily give a tax break and then ruin our economy and government by running up huge deficits. How does that help you and me? We will just have to pay this all back in time.
Furthermore, if you have ever taken advantage of a tax break program like the Earned Income Tax Credit, then your entire argument that you never use welfare is nullified. You owe the government your very existence, Steve. The nature of any society influences the nature of all of it's citizens. Thus, a citizen should constantly be working to improve the lives of all the members of that society. I think of myself as part of a beautiful whole and behave as if my actions affect that whole. When I am hiking in our parks, I pick up trash. When I am walking or driving, I obey the laws. If I find that some part of our society is detrimental, I work to change that part through legal means.
This is the basic difference between you and me, Steve. You think that your actions do not affect anyone else. You entire worldview is centered around yourself. This is a core Republican't belief. "My life is my own and no one ever did nothing for me." That is complete crap and you know it. There are people that helped you but you choose to ignore them and because you think you did it yourself, this allows you to ignore the suffering of others. With attitudes like that, maybe we should all wipe our species off the planet.
Steve, you keep harping on about welfare and medicare/medicaid programs but are strangely silent on one point of my post: the COLA and a lack of a living federal wage.
Do you see the blatant hypocrisy of the Republican't position. A living wage is good enough for a Representative but it is not good enough for the rest of the country. The Republican'ts are blocking an amendment to raise the federal minimum wage. You claim to have been poor in your life, but I guess you have never earned minimum wage or you would vote for representatives that try to raise it .
In regards to your other point about welfare and the income tax. The tax pays for government services which keeps people off the streets and out of desperation. Well, that was the goal of those services you like to refer to as welfare. What you fail to understand is that helping people out of poverty prevents crime at a much more efficient rate than hiring law enforcement officers. Republican'ts have been slashing funding for pretty much everything but defense, and I use that term loosely, for decades. Now that these arenas are dangerously close to complete collapse, Republican'ts claim that the system is completely broken and we should either trash it entirely or cut it's funding further to force it to become more efficient.
A government service (like Amtrak) should never be expected to turn a profit and if it did, the Republican'ts would just try to privatize it anyway. What sort of profit is the war in Iraq generating? Oh, that's right, the US Armed Forces are now a mercenary organization and are currently under contract to Halliburton in Iraq.
Don't even get me started on the difference between law enforcement and keeping the peace.
In conclusion, Steve, your arguments are as bankrupt as the Republican'ts morals.
Steve, you cannot buy soda with food stamps. So, yet again you've got no argument or debtate. You do however have a nice set of stereotypes. Bravo!
Perhaps someone should have paid more for your education not less, because what little you have is sparkling on this blog.
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