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02-18-2017, 02:30 AM
(This post was last modified: 02-18-2017, 02:41 AM by Classic-Xer.)
(02-17-2017, 05:28 PM)David Horn Wrote: (02-17-2017, 12:14 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: (02-16-2017, 02:55 PM)David Horn Wrote: (02-16-2017, 01:22 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. I assume that that blue mindset must have died with JFK.
Since you brought it up, what have you done for your country?
I've done a helluva lot more for the country than PB, Odin and Eric. I will most likely surpass you as far as overall accomplishments and contributions as far as jobs, wages and financial contributions relating to tax revenues and the continued funding of liberal programs are concerned.
FWIW, I wasn't asking about money. That's Trump talk. I was asking about blood and sweat. I can't claim any greatness in those areas either, but I did serve and I have lent my hand to others needing it more often than I probably should. I've always been tickled by the conservative/liberatrian phallange that argues it isn't important, or, worse, that it destroys their dignity or work ethic. Are you in that group? I sincerely hope not.
As they say, money makes the world go round. That's American talk. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into the establishment of a long standing American business. A lot of blood and sweat went into establishing a life long career with higher wages that paid off school loans and a couple thousand in grants with the tax dollars that were contributed over the following years. I helped out others (family members and close friends) over the years who were in dire straits and really needed some help. I've helped past employees through tough times. I have donated a fair amount of money to various groups like the veterans, 9/11 fund, hurricane Katrina, the disabled and so forth. I've done volunteer work for non profit organizations and I've held board positions with no expectations of being compensated. I'm not a fan of dependency. I don't like being used or being taken advantage of by people. So, I don't go over board with the notion of helping people. I limit the amount of my commitment both financially and time wise.
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(02-17-2017, 03:10 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: (02-17-2017, 12:14 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: (02-16-2017, 02:55 PM)David Horn Wrote: (02-16-2017, 01:22 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. I assume that that blue mindset must have died with JFK.
Since you brought it up, what have you done for your country?
I've done a helluva lot more for the country than PB, Odin and Eric. I will most likely surpass you as far as overall accomplishments and contributions as far as jobs, wages and financial contributions relating to tax revenues and the continued funding of liberal programs are concerned.
I would have done a heck of a lot more had someone diagnosed Asperger's syndrome in me when I was young, and I might have even become a conservative Republican on economic matters. I might even have become an elected public official, and I would be just the one to deal with on matters of handicaps. With Asperger's as bad as I have it I might have a family -- with adopted children. It may be a good thing that I have sired no children who might end up institutionalized for severe autism. Like attracts like, so I might have found someone with a similar tendency (Asperger's) as a wife.
But -- I recognize the value of formal education, the need for legal precedent, and for an economic order that helps people who don't have everything going for them.
I'd rather have a well-paying job that inflicts heavy taxes on me.
Asperger's seems to be fairly common in this forum.
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(02-18-2017, 02:30 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: As they say, money makes the world go round. That's American talk. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into the establishment of a long standing American business. A lot of blood and sweat went into establishing a life long career with higher wages that paid off school loans and a couple thousand in grants with the tax dollars that were contributed over the following years. I helped out others (family members and close friends) over the years who were in dire straits and really needed some help. I've helped past employees through tough times. I have donated a fair amount of money to various groups like the veterans, 9/11 fund, hurricane Katrina, the disabled and so forth. I've done volunteer work for non profit organizations and I've held board positions with no expectations of being compensated. I'm not a fan of dependency. I don't like being used or being taken advantage of by people. So, I don't go over board with the notion of helping people. I limit the amount of my commitment both financially and time wise.
This is all good, but you still have a blind spot about who or what deserves your support. A society that consists of a high percentage of failures, for whatever reason, is one that is not worth inhabitting. Appalachia is already heading down that step road to nowhere, and most of the cause is the business decisioins of many entities to stop using coal. There is no fault there! Coal is dead, but the mining communities need it to thrive. It can't happen.
So other alternatives are needed, and self-sufficiency isn't even a remote possiblity. Retraining is a good idea, though how and who pays may make it imposible. Nonetheless, retraining for what? Someone in their 40s with no schooling beyond highschool can't easily stop, go to school for a year or two, then get a job when no jobs exist. That's the missing piece in your world view. It's also futile to blame the people for making bad decision in the past for two reasons. Those decision were not stupid at the time, and the past is past. Going back is not an option.
So leaving things to rot only let's the rot spread, but doing something requires lots of money -- and the money must come from the public sector. Private sector investment mandates ROI, and saving entire communities (or neighborhoods) is not a profit making venture. All options availble have negatives, but doing nothing has no positives either.
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(02-18-2017, 08:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: (02-18-2017, 02:30 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: As they say, money makes the world go round. That's American talk. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into the establishment of a long standing American business. A lot of blood and sweat went into establishing a life long career with higher wages that paid off school loans and a couple thousand in grants with the tax dollars that were contributed over the following years. I helped out others (family members and close friends) over the years who were in dire straits and really needed some help. I've helped past employees through tough times. I have donated a fair amount of money to various groups like the veterans, 9/11 fund, hurricane Katrina, the disabled and so forth. I've done volunteer work for non profit organizations and I've held board positions with no expectations of being compensated. I'm not a fan of dependency. I don't like being used or being taken advantage of by people. So, I don't go over board with the notion of helping people. I limit the amount of my commitment both financially and time wise.
This is all good, but you still have a blind spot about who or what deserves your support. A society that consists of a high percentage of failures, for whatever reason, is one that is not worth inhabitting. Appalachia is already heading down that step road to nowhere, and most of the cause is the business decisioins of many entities to stop using coal. There is no fault there! Coal is dead, but the mining communities need it to thrive. It can't happen.
So other alternatives are needed, and self-sufficiency isn't even a remote possiblity. Retraining is a good idea, though how and who pays may make it imposible. Nonetheless, retraining for what? Someone in their 40s with no schooling beyond highschool can't easily stop, go to school for a year or two, then get a job when no jobs exist. That's the missing piece in your world view. It's also futile to blame the people for making bad decision in the past for two reasons. Those decision were not stupid at the time, and the past is past. Going back is not an option.
Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
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(02-18-2017, 02:30 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: As they say, money makes the world go round. That's American talk. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into the establishment of a long standing American business. A lot of blood and sweat went into establishing a life long career with higher wages that paid off school loans and a couple thousand in grants with the tax dollars that were contributed over the following years. I helped out others (family members and close friends) over the years who were in dire straits and really needed some help. I've helped past employees through tough times. I have donated a fair amount of money to various groups like the veterans, 9/11 fund, hurricane Katrina, the disabled and so forth. I've done volunteer work for non profit organizations and I've held board positions with no expectations of being compensated. I'm not a fan of dependency. I don't like being used or being taken advantage of by people. So, I don't go over board with the notion of helping people. I limit the amount of my commitment both financially and time wise.
According to Christopher Isherwood, author of The Berlin Stories and I Am a Camera, the idea that money makes the world go around isn't particularly American. It applies with a vengeance when people are in extreme distress of need. When people aren't in such severe economic distress as they were in Germany around 1930 they might let something else drive the world (as a metaphor in contrast to angular momentum, gravitation, and basic realities of matter) -- like happiness, reason, hope, love, kindness, courage, creativity, or fun.
I will take mindless hedonism over rational greed as something to make the world go around. You know well what I think of mindless hedonism. I have noticed that greed and materialism are most common in people in economic distress.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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02-19-2017, 01:49 AM
(This post was last modified: 02-19-2017, 07:18 PM by Eric the Green.)
(02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: (02-18-2017, 08:26 AM)David Horn Wrote: (02-18-2017, 02:30 AM)Classic-Xer Wrote: As they say, money makes the world go round. That's American talk. A lot of blood, sweat and tears went into the establishment of a long standing American business. A lot of blood and sweat went into establishing a life long career with higher wages that paid off school loans and a couple thousand in grants with the tax dollars that were contributed over the following years. I helped out others (family members and close friends) over the years who were in dire straits and really needed some help. I've helped past employees through tough times. I have donated a fair amount of money to various groups like the veterans, 9/11 fund, hurricane Katrina, the disabled and so forth. I've done volunteer work for non profit organizations and I've held board positions with no expectations of being compensated. I'm not a fan of dependency. I don't like being used or being taken advantage of by people. So, I don't go over board with the notion of helping people. I limit the amount of my commitment both financially and time wise.
This is all good, but you still have a blind spot about who or what deserves your support. A society that consists of a high percentage of failures, for whatever reason, is one that is not worth inhabitting. Appalachia is already heading down that step road to nowhere, and most of the cause is the business decisioins of many entities to stop using coal. There is no fault there! Coal is dead, but the mining communities need it to thrive. It can't happen.
So other alternatives are needed, and self-sufficiency isn't even a remote possiblity. Retraining is a good idea, though how and who pays may make it imposible. Nonetheless, retraining for what? Someone in their 40s with no schooling beyond highschool can't easily stop, go to school for a year or two, then get a job when no jobs exist. That's the missing piece in your world view. It's also futile to blame the people for making bad decision in the past for two reasons. Those decision were not stupid at the time, and the past is past. Going back is not an option.
Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
It is beyond clear that the people in Appalachia have voted themselves into their own misery by supporting Republicans out of prejudice. They don't bother to consider the coal waste that Trump and the Republicans think is just fine to dump into their rivers, even though it's making them sick, and they have no health care for this thanks to the Republicans too. These people have trusted their coal barons and have left themselves without any social support and declining jobs in industries that have no future. So they blame the liberals because the liberals are interested in helping them and people of color too. "Oh I don't need dependency on big government; please pass the needle!" It is tragic and ridiculous what these people are doing to themselves. And it's the fossil fuels companies that moved into North Dakota to make a killing and get rich, and just because the price drops a little they leave everything behind for Republicans there to clean up. Unfortunately Republicans like Trump and Pruitt don't give a damn about the environment, and will stop at nothing to destroy, defile, abuse, ruin, kill, pollute and generally screw it up for as long as they can. And they can buy their only Democratic Senator too. It's a neat trick to blame environmental groups for this, who have tried to stop fracking and who have no power and no access to it in that Republican-run, fracked, oil-gangster-run state. But Classic Xer, you'd rather tell more big lies than face the fact that the folks you vote for don't care a damn about you, at all, at all, at all! Willfully ignorant of the big red, white and blue dick that's being shoved up your ass every day.
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(02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
Well, I live near, if not in, Appalachia, and the people there sound a lot like you. The only difference: there is no other economy to keep the places vital. Minnesota has everything from the Mayo Clinic to several major corproations, 3M being the most obviously attached to the state. It's not accidental that states like Minnesota incubate or attract economic engines. States less concerned about taxes and more concerned about infrastructure and quality of life tend to attract the people that big companies need to flourish. So thank your blue state for a large part of your own personal success. Without the higher paid workforce, you wouldn't be doing much business.
And on your point about caring: Robert Kennedy went to Appalchia and tried his damnedest to light a fire there. LBJ actually dumped money into the area duering the entire Guns Ns Butter period. But in the end, it's the people who live there that matter, and the people in most parts of Appalachia seem hellbent on staying where they are and as they are. No one can change that from the outside. The best anyone can do is be there when the lightbulb finally comes on. Your side decided to tell them to piss-off. We'll see if that works in the long term.
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02-19-2017, 12:21 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-19-2017, 12:35 PM by Bob Butler 54.)
(02-19-2017, 10:49 AM)David Horn Wrote: (02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
Well, I live near, if not in, Appalachia, and the people there sound a lot like you. The only difference: there is no other economy to keep the places vital. Minnesota has everything from the Mayo Clinic to several major corproations, 3M being the most obviously attached to the state. It's not accidental that states like Minnesota incubate or attract economic engines. States less concerned about taxes and more concerned about infrastructure and quality of life tend to attract the people that big companies need to flourish. So thank your blue state for a large part of your own personal success. Without the higher paid workforce, you wouldn't be doing much business.
And on your point about caring: Robert Kennedy went to Appalchia and tried his damnedest to light a fire there. LBJ actually dumped money into the area duering the entire Guns Ns Butter period. But in the end, it's the people who live there that matter, and the people in most parts of Appalachia seem hellbent on staying where they are and as they are. No one can change that from the outside. The best anyone can do is be there when the lightbulb finally comes on. Your side decided to tell them to piss-off. We'll see if that works in the long term.
I'd again recommend Hillbilly Eulogy for those who want an understanding of Hillbilly / Rust Belt culture.
A while back, in the time of burning lots of coal and people intensive manufacturing, there were lots of hard work repetitive jobs in the Appalachia and Rust Belt areas. Let it not be said that the Hillbilly culture hasn't its strengths and didn't fit in quite well in the past, thank you. The economy is changing, though. Less coal being dug. Fewer humans are manning the assembly lines. The new economy tends to require more education.
To some degree, those flexible and bright enough to adapt have already left the Appalachia / Rust Belt area.
I don't think the well educated flexible person should consider himself so superior to the guy who isn't afraid of a little hard work. One trait is useless without the other. A good employee ought to have some of both. Still, given the changing economy and technology, leaning more towards the educated side will make it easier to get a job. Those sitting around waiting for coal and manual manufacturing jobs to reappear are apt to be sitting around for quite a while.
And, yes, blue urban areas with good education infrastructure are doing reasonably well. Many who have chosen to ride that bandwagon are in better shape than some others. And, yes, those who haven't changed bandwagons can get sullen and resentful. They will whine and pout. That's fine, but how does that help them?
The question is what might be done to help things. Can one force a company that requires well educated workers to locate where such workers are hard to find? Can the government sponsor education, or spend money to create jobs? Is it the red states or the blue who are apt to be working to educate desirable workers, or to attract them? Is it not the red mantra that everything the government does is futile and counter productive, thus the red areas are conceding the new economy to the blue areas?
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02-19-2017, 02:44 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-19-2017, 02:44 PM by Cynic Hero '86.)
The boomer establishment is tyrannical: if you think Assad, for example, is a monster; why don't you selfish boomer do-gooders permit a vote on whether Assad is villain or not and allow decisions on whether to take action against him be determined by the vote of the American People.
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(02-19-2017, 02:44 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: The boomer establishment is tyrannical: if you think Assad, for example, is a monster; why don't you selfish boomer do-gooders permit a vote on whether Assad is villain or not and allow decisions on whether to take action against him be determined by the vote of the American People.
Foreign policy by popular vote would indeed be a new thing. Lately, the president pretty much determines foreign policy with congressional approval required if force is to be used. There is currently a Republican president and a Republican congress. How is it that the blue boomers are supposed to have a major say in the matter? Other than your personal prejudice which leads you to blame blue boomers for anything you don't like, how are they involved at all?
Can you give an example of when the United States has held a vote on whether or not to go to war?
Do you have even a passing familiarity with reality?
That this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth.
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02-19-2017, 08:37 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-19-2017, 08:37 PM by Cynic Hero '86.)
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(02-19-2017, 08:37 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: (02-19-2017, 06:50 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: (02-19-2017, 02:44 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: The boomer establishment is tyrannical: if you think Assad, for example, is a monster; why don't you selfish boomer do-gooders permit a vote on whether Assad is villain or not and allow decisions on whether to take action against him be determined by the vote of the American People.
Foreign policy by popular vote would indeed be a new thing. Lately, the president pretty much determines foreign policy with congressional approval required if force is to be used. There is currently a Republican president and a Republican congress. How is it that the blue boomers are supposed to have a major say in the matter? Other than your personal prejudice which leads you to blame blue boomers for anything you don't like, how are they involved at all?
Can you give an example of when the United States has held a vote on whether or not to go to war?
Do you have even a passing familiarity with reality?
Who said I'm Primarily against blue boomers only? No I consider the enemy to be Bourgeois Neo-Liberalism and Globalism in general of whom Hillary Clinton and John Mccain are the most prominent representatives of said value system. Trump whether you like him or hate him was right regarding his statement regarding mccains war record.
Examples of strong leadership Throughout History: (Snip)
You're still going with the Adolph Hitler / Genghis Kahn style of leadership by genocide? No thank you. So long as you are promoting genocide, I'm not agreeing with your style of leadership.
Tell me, did any of your strong leaders hold a popular vote on whether they should go to war or not?
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(02-19-2017, 10:49 AM)David Horn Wrote: (02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
Well, I live near, if not in, Appalachia, and the people there sound a lot like you. The only difference: there is no other economy to keep the places vital. Minnesota has everything from the Mayo Clinic to several major corproations, 3M being the most obviously attached to the state. It's not accidental that states like Minnesota incubate or attract economic engines. States less concerned about taxes and more concerned about infrastructure and quality of life tend to attract the people that big companies need to flourish. So thank your blue state for a large part of your own personal success. Without the higher paid workforce, you wouldn't be doing much business.
And on your point about caring: Robert Kennedy went to Appalchia and tried his damnedest to light a fire there. LBJ actually dumped money into the area duering the entire Guns Ns Butter period. But in the end, it's the people who live there that matter, and the people in most parts of Appalachia seem hellbent on staying where they are and as they are. No one can change that from the outside. The best anyone can do is be there when the lightbulb finally comes on. Your side decided to tell them to piss-off. We'll see if that works in the long term.
Robert Kennedy and LBJ haven't been around for a long time. Minnesota has a fairly diverse economy and an adult population that is more business minded than the adults associated with past era's.
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The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
1. As I suggest to fellow liberals, quit using such regional slurs as "hillbilly", "redneck", "peckerwood", and the like to describe people in the Mountain South. I see little reason to believe that you see them as anything more than cheap labor or cannon fodder. Such people to you might as well be something that rhymes with triggers, and the shared characteristic of such people is (to you) their expendability.
2. The Mountain South has not kept pace with the progress in the rest of America. It went deeply into consumerism when there was good money in coal or lead mining (Missouri), but it did a poor job of making the choices to improve infrastructure and invest in formal education. This is not simply a cultural choice: it also happened to a certain extent in Michigan and Ohio in which state and local politicians chose to keep taxes down and not spend on education that would be necessary with the decline of the auto and tire industries. This is already going on in Louisiana, which has a surprisingly-high per capita income but extreme inequality.
When the coal seams get worked out, when lead becomes a dangerous substance, when the automotive industry is no longer a growth industry concentrated in one state, and when oil wells go dry, failure to put something aside in good times as a hedge when economic realities get more difficult is a blunder.
It is unwise to commit everything to a dying, doomed, or even declining industry unless one has a life expectancy short enough to justify such. But what have I said about blunders? They first seem obviously right.
3. People are free to have negative views of the communities in which they live. I have cultural values inconsistent with a place in which I find myself stuck -- a place where culture is to be bought at Wal*Mart. Cultural life here is cable TV and whatever happen to be in one's book, video, and music collection. My musical taste suggests that I pronounce the letter w like a v or that I have a hacek or umlaut in my surname.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(02-20-2017, 01:35 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: (02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
1. As I suggest to fellow liberals, quit using such regional slurs as "hillbilly", "redneck", "peckerwood", and the like to describe people in the Mountain South. I see little reason to believe that you see them as anything more than cheap labor or cannon fodder. Such people to you might as well be something that rhymes with triggers, and the shared characteristic of such people is (to you) their expendability.
2. The Mountain South has not kept pace with the progress in the rest of America. It went deeply into consumerism when there was good money in coal or lead mining (Missouri), but it did a poor job of making the choices to improve infrastructure and invest in formal education. This is not simply a cultural choice: it also happened to a certain extent in Michigan and Ohio in which state and local politicians chose to keep taxes down and not spend on education that would be necessary with the decline of the auto and tire industries. This is already going on in Louisiana, which has a surprisingly-high per capita income but extreme inequality.
When the coal seams get worked out, when lead becomes a dangerous substance, when the automotive industry is no longer a growth industry concentrated in one state, and when oil wells go dry, failure to put something aside in good times as a hedge when economic realities get more difficult is a blunder.
It is unwise to commit everything to a dying, doomed, or even declining industry unless one has a life expectancy short enough to justify such. But what have I said about blunders? They first seem obviously right.
3. People are free to have negative views of the communities in which they live. I have cultural values inconsistent with a place in which I find myself stuck -- a place where culture is to be bought at Wal*Mart. Cultural life here is cable TV and whatever happen to be in one's book, video, and music collection. My musical taste suggests that I pronounce the letter w like a v or that I have a hacek or umlaut in my surname.
M&L should take a stroll through largely uneducated "nigger, spick, gook, neo-Nazy " inner city culture to see if the issues are worse than lesser educated "pecker wood, hillbilly, redneck" culture that the two of you are so embarrassed to be associated with. Do you see many drive by shootings, large scale riots and major interruption in people's lifestyles where the two of you live? I'm sure the two of you wouldn't mind dying of a heart attack because Black Lives Matter or some other fucked up (fucked up values wise) liberal group shut down a road which delayed your ambulance? Why are so-called liberals viewed by themselves as being so special? Who teaches so-called liberals to believe that they're so special? Who teaches/taught/led them to believe that the blue halo's that were given to them by some so-called liberals were permanently attached to them? Who disproved that foolish liberal belief/ideal a long time ago?
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02-20-2017, 04:49 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-20-2017, 04:50 PM by Eric the Green.)
(02-20-2017, 04:34 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: (02-20-2017, 01:35 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: (02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
1. As I suggest to fellow liberals, quit using such regional slurs as "hillbilly", "redneck", "peckerwood", and the like to describe people in the Mountain South. I see little reason to believe that you see them as anything more than cheap labor or cannon fodder. Such people to you might as well be something that rhymes with triggers, and the shared characteristic of such people is (to you) their expendability.
2. The Mountain South has not kept pace with the progress in the rest of America. It went deeply into consumerism when there was good money in coal or lead mining (Missouri), but it did a poor job of making the choices to improve infrastructure and invest in formal education. This is not simply a cultural choice: it also happened to a certain extent in Michigan and Ohio in which state and local politicians chose to keep taxes down and not spend on education that would be necessary with the decline of the auto and tire industries. This is already going on in Louisiana, which has a surprisingly-high per capita income but extreme inequality.
When the coal seams get worked out, when lead becomes a dangerous substance, when the automotive industry is no longer a growth industry concentrated in one state, and when oil wells go dry, failure to put something aside in good times as a hedge when economic realities get more difficult is a blunder.
It is unwise to commit everything to a dying, doomed, or even declining industry unless one has a life expectancy short enough to justify such. But what have I said about blunders? They first seem obviously right.
3. People are free to have negative views of the communities in which they live. I have cultural values inconsistent with a place in which I find myself stuck -- a place where culture is to be bought at Wal*Mart. Cultural life here is cable TV and whatever happen to be in one's book, video, and music collection. My musical taste suggests that I pronounce the letter w like a v or that I have a hacek or umlaut in my surname.
M&L should take a stroll through largely uneducated "nigger, spick, gook, neo-Nazy " inner city culture to see if the issues are worse than lesser educated "pecker wood, hillbilly, redneck" culture that the two of you are so embarrassed to be associated with. Do you see many drive by shootings, large scale riots and major interruption in people's lifestyles where the two of you live? I'm sure the two of you wouldn't mind dying of a heart attack because Black Lives Matter or some other fucked up (fucked up values wise) liberal group shut down a road which delayed your ambulance? Why are so-called liberals viewed by themselves as being so special? Who teaches so-called liberals to believe that they're so special? Who teaches/taught/led them to believe that the blue halo's that were given to them by some so-called liberals were permanently attached to them? Who disproved that foolish liberal belief/ideal a long time ago?
Oh, we know we're special because we're so well-informed, well-educated, well-intentioned people of conscience while you hillbillie wood-pecked fools are lost in your prejudices and fears. I am proud to wear my blue halo, and think it looks good on me. You ought to try it on! 
And I think our values of caring for the less fortunate and for the future of our country and planet with abundance and peace for all are pretty good ones, as opposed to yours that consist of selfish greed and superstition. And I suppose the white folks in Appalachia and other red states would not be so placid if some black cops started shooting them down in the streets for no reason. And at least in the blue states we can call on an ambulance or other health facilities and we'd have them available, unlike the folks in the backwoods who vote Republican and thus vote themselves out of any health coverage at all.
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02-20-2017, 05:38 PM
(This post was last modified: 02-20-2017, 10:35 PM by pbrower2a.)
(02-20-2017, 04:34 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: (02-20-2017, 01:35 AM)pbrower2a Wrote: (02-18-2017, 03:55 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Appalachia? I don't live in Appalachia (Hill Billy territory). I live near a couple of big stinky, hazy and more polluted blue cities that's loaded with people who believe that they are more important than those who live around them. Big city liberals/rural liberals don't seem to give a shit about those in Appalachia based on the liberal views of the people who currently live there and those who still view the region as their home and their negative views of the region, the use of it's primary resource (coal) and all the American industries (American companies, American products and American jobs associated with all of them) that are closely related to them in general. Did you see the environmental mess that the so-called environmentalist groups left behind for others to clean up in North Dakota?
1. As I suggest to fellow liberals, quit using such regional slurs as "hillbilly", "redneck", "peckerwood", and the like to describe people in the Mountain South. I see little reason to believe that you see them as anything more than cheap labor or cannon fodder. Such people to you might as well be something that rhymes with triggers, and the shared characteristic of such people is (to you) their expendability.
2. The Mountain South has not kept pace with the progress in the rest of America. It went deeply into consumerism when there was good money in coal or lead mining (Missouri), but it did a poor job of making the choices to improve infrastructure and invest in formal education. This is not simply a cultural choice: it also happened to a certain extent in Michigan and Ohio in which state and local politicians chose to keep taxes down and not spend on education that would be necessary with the decline of the auto and tire industries. This is already going on in Louisiana, which has a surprisingly-high per capita income but extreme inequality.
When the coal seams get worked out, when lead becomes a dangerous substance, when the automotive industry is no longer a growth industry concentrated in one state, and when oil wells go dry, failure to put something aside in good times as a hedge when economic realities get more difficult is a blunder.
It is unwise to commit everything to a dying, doomed, or even declining industry unless one has a life expectancy short enough to justify such. But what have I said about blunders? They first seem obviously right.
3. People are free to have negative views of the communities in which they live. I have cultural values inconsistent with a place in which I find myself stuck -- a place where culture is to be bought at Wal*Mart. Cultural life here is cable TV and whatever happen to be in one's book, video, and music collection. My musical taste suggests that I pronounce the letter w like a v or that I have a hacek or umlaut in my surname.
M&L should take a stroll through largely uneducated [ethnic slurs expunged] inner city culture to see if the issues are worse than lesser educated "pecker wood, hillbilly, redneck" culture that the two of you are so embarrassed to be associated with.
Uh, maybe you missed what I had to say about my musical preferences. European languages that use umlauts include German, Hungarian, Swedish, Finnish, Estonian, and Turkish (only in a small part of Europe. Languages that use the háček include Czech, Slovak, Sorb, Slovene, Croatian, Latvian, and Lithuanian. Dutch, German, and Polish use the letter w to represent a v sound ...
My musical tastes suggest Central Europe, in case you didn't get the hint.
I have little reason to go to the inner city. Did you know that cops in Hartford, Connecticut profile some drug offenders by license plate and hence color? If you are young and white and have Vermont license plates and drive into the slums of Hartford you had better have a good reason. Buying drugs in Hartford for sale in Vermont? Solicitation of prostitution? The Hartford slums have few legitimate attractions to outsiders.
Quote:Do you see many drive by shootings, large scale riots and major interruption in people's lifestyles where the two of you live?
I have a cousin who got caught up in a shooting because her house had a neighbor in a gang. One common technique of intimidating members of rival gangs is to shoot at the neighbor's house. That was in greater Los Angeles. She could probably pass as Hispanic.
Crime used to be much more of a menace, but except for drug activity among white people it has generally gone down. Police have cracked down on drive-by shootings; in almost all jurisdictions it is a criminal offense to fire a gun from inside a motor vehicle. But President Obama hasn't been soft on crime. Like most liberals he has come to recognize that criminal behavior is a frequent habit of comparatively few people, the one-man crime waves. Community organizers like Barack Obama figured out quickly that he needed to know where the drug activity was so that he could avoid it.
Quote:I'm sure the two of you wouldn't mind dying of a heart attack because Black Lives Matter or some other [offensive language redacted] liberal group shut down a road which delayed your ambulance?
First, I do not own an ambulance. Second, I would reasonably expect people in a protest to yield to any emergency vehicle, including an ambulance, a fire truck, or a police car.
Quote:Why are so-called liberals viewed by themselves as being so special? Who teaches so-called liberals to believe that they're so special?
All human life is special, lest life not be worth much. When I witness pointless poverty I find my life debased. There but for the Grace of God go I. But if all life is special, then mine is not particularly special.
Quote:Who teaches/taught/led them to believe that the blue halo's that were given to them by some so-called liberals were permanently attached to them? Who disproved that foolish liberal belief/ideal a long time ago?
It all started when some wise people questioned whether kings could rule by divine right....
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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(02-19-2017, 08:43 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: (02-19-2017, 08:37 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: (02-19-2017, 06:50 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: (02-19-2017, 02:44 PM)Cynic Hero Wrote: The boomer establishment is tyrannical: if you think Assad, for example, is a monster; why don't you selfish boomer do-gooders permit a vote on whether Assad is villain or not and allow decisions on whether to take action against him be determined by the vote of the American People.
Foreign policy by popular vote would indeed be a new thing. Lately, the president pretty much determines foreign policy with congressional approval required if force is to be used. There is currently a Republican president and a Republican congress. How is it that the blue boomers are supposed to have a major say in the matter? Other than your personal prejudice which leads you to blame blue boomers for anything you don't like, how are they involved at all?
Can you give an example of when the United States has held a vote on whether or not to go to war?
Do you have even a passing familiarity with reality?
Who said I'm Primarily against blue boomers only? No I consider the enemy to be Bourgeois Neo-Liberalism and Globalism in general of whom Hillary Clinton and John Mccain are the most prominent representatives of said value system. Trump whether you like him or hate him was right regarding his statement regarding mccains war record.
Examples of strong leadership Throughout History: (Snip)
You're still going with the Adolph Hitler / Genghis Kahn style of leadership by genocide? No thank you. So long as you are promoting genocide, I'm not agreeing with your style of leadership.
Tell me, did any of your strong leaders hold a popular vote on whether they should go to war or not?
Show me a war that didn't have congressional support? Was completely pulling out of Iraq, further assisting with the toppling of long standing military regimes which resulted in the rise of ISIS and the greatest humanitarian crisis that the world has seen since World War II, on the ballot in or openly debated in 08'? Well, we can pretty much guarantee that we'll be killing/bombing/disrupting radical Islamic's for the rest of our lifetime and we can pretty much guarantee that there won't be a blue minded President until we are done with radical Islam.
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(02-20-2017, 10:09 PM)Classic-Xer Wrote: Show me a war that didn't have congressional support? Was completely pulling out of Iraq, further assisting with the toppling of long standing military regimes which resulted in the rise of ISIS and the greatest humanitarian crisis that the world has seen since World War II, on the ballot in or openly debated in 08'? Well, we can pretty much guarantee that we'll be killing/bombing/disrupting radical Islamic's for the rest of our lifetime and we can pretty much guarantee that there won't be a blue minded President until we are done with radical Islam.
Reader, suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself. -- Mark Twain
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.
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