The wealthy want the government to shoo away the poor.

[glenn1]

This isn't hard. There is nothing in the article singling out either party. Your response attacking Democrats was therefore gratuitously partisan, as well as completely useless (a common them with your posts, whatever the topic). Only now, while trying to excuse your behavior, do you acknowledge that both parties are at fault. You fool nobody.

The story in the OP is about Palo Alto. Which is run by Democrats. QED.

Feel free to post an article with something stupid being done in a Republican bastion, and I'll gladly bash them too. You should have plenty of material to choose from.

 

[Bowfinger]

The article was a hit piece against "the 1%", the responses have been proportional.

Aversion to homeless is something that spans all walks of life, all backgrounds, all income levels. ...

I don't understand your point. The "1%" encompasses both parties. I agree that discomfort with the homeless extends throughout society (not just the 1%), and it's valid to criticize the article on that basis. You were the first to raise that issue, however.

 

[Bowfinger]

The story in the OP is about Palo Alto. Which is run by Democrats. QED.

Feel free to post an article with something stupid being done in a Republican bastion, and I'll gladly bash them too. You should have plenty of material to choose from.

Yawn. Or you could grow up and stop framing every single issue in empty partisan terms. Had you actually read this article, you might note that it references Palo Alto as only the latest of many cities to pass such laws. You fool nobody.

 

[glenn1]

Yawn. Or you could grow up and stop framing every single issue in empty partisan terms. Had you actually read this article, you might note that it references Palo Alto as only the latest of many cities to pass such laws. You fool nobody.

Okay, fine. Great job, Palo Alto city Democrats. Keep up the good work.

 

[Zaap]

Food stamps and Medicaid have both been booming under Obama. And what would you do about "offshoring" and the other problems, pass a law saying textile jobs are only for Americans and not Bangaladeshis? What a pointless reversion to throwing out tired old Democratic boogeymen. As if voting for Obama will bring back the "good ol' days" when American workers were fat, happy, and oblivious screwing lug nuts onto Ford Pintos. Or maybe you yearn for the days when half of employed blacks were domestic workers in white folk's homes?

If you want to say "Democrats certainly aren't responsibile" then be my guest, since you own the executive branch you're admitting complete inability to fix the problem. Which was exactly my point, they're completely worthless and are in many cases (like this one) exacerbating the problem.

Just an observation: you're one of the most intelligent and realistic people here, but you're litterally wasting words on the least intelligent and unrealistic. Everything with these hacks is whining about "the rich" and sucking up to government and creating more problems just so they can whine about them. The rich and frankly everyone else are smart to keep their money, jobs, assets etc. as far away as possible from such lunatics. So why bother? I'd sooner expect a rock to solve any problem in the real world than our resident mindless leftloons.

 

[Incorruptible]

My thoughts on rich Democrats is exactly the same as my thoughts on rich Republicans: They should pay highly progressive taxation at higher rates than they currently are, and be able to pass on to their kids only enough money to pay for college and basic luxuries. Reward success in this life, but being born rich while others live in poverty is an abomination. The world would be a much better place if the rich knew their kids would have to earn their own way in the world, and therefore had incentive to support safety nets for temporary setbacks, and actually had to give their money to charities of their choosing at death to avoid giving it to the government when they die. If they did that, we might not actually need as big of a government.

They shouldn't pay higher taxes just because you want more welfare for yourself. It takes a pathetic excuse of a human being to spout this BS. You have no right to their money and who are you to tell them how much they can pass on to their kids. You want to spend other peoples money on poverty but why not spend your own?

Ouch. Perhaps the thread title should be changed to reflect that it is apparently wealthy liberals that want the poor shooed out of their cities.

A place so liberal mind you that a guy should have known he would get lynched for donating to support Prop 8.

So liberals want to get rid of the poor off the streets and can't be bothered by them? Not surprised at all.

 

[berzerker60]

They shouldn't pay higher taxes just because you want more welfare for yourself. It takes a pathetic excuse of a human being to spout this BS. You have no right to their money and who are you to tell them how much they can pass on to their kids. You want to spend other peoples money on poverty but why not spend your own?

Why in the world do you think I want welfare for myself? I do just fine, I don't need anything. People in poverty are the ones who need more help, and beyond that there is plenty to pay for: deficit reduction, eventually debt reduction, improved and maintained infrastructure, scientific research and development. I do want to include myself in my higher taxation scheme, and I'm happy to pay higher taxes for expanded services and safety nets. In any case, the point is that I think being born rich is itself evil - people should work for their success, with no silver spoons and endless trust funds.

Incidentally, that's 100% in line with Christian thinking, if you actually cared about that. Christianity is very, very explicitly against being and dying rich. Jesus couldn't be any clearer about the necessity of giving what you have to the poor throughout your life, but especially before you die. If you're actually a Christian, what do you care about estate taxes? No one should be rich at that point anyway, so estate taxes are completely irrelevant and will never come into effect.

So liberals want to get rid of the poor off the streets and can't be bothered by them? Not surprised at all.

Lots and lots of liberals are truly shitty people. (Lots and lots of everyone are shitty people)

 

[Jhhnn]

Food stamps and Medicaid have both been booming under Obama. And what would you do about "offshoring" and the other problems, pass a law saying textile jobs are only for Americans and not Bangaladeshis? What a pointless reversion to throwing out tired old Democratic boogeymen. As if voting for Obama will bring back the "good ol' days" when American workers were fat, happy, and oblivious screwing lug nuts onto Ford Pintos. Or maybe you yearn for the days when half of employed blacks were domestic workers in white folk's homes?

And, uhh, what do Libertopians propose? I already pointed out that the Welfare State is a necessity under current economic conditions, just the way that the Job Creators! have made it. What should be done instead?

If you want to say "Democrats certainly aren't responsibile" then be my guest, since you own the executive branch you're admitting complete inability to fix the problem. Which was exactly my point, they're completely worthless and are in many cases (like this one) exacerbating the problem.

Owning the executive branch doesn't appropriate funds. It doesn't hold unemployment insurance hostage to top tier tax cuts, either.

 

[piasabird]

No matter how much you spend on the poor they will want more and more.

 

[hal2kilo]

I doubt the 1% ters even are aware that things are so bad that whole families are living in cars on the streets. It's scary outside of the gates.

 

[Jhhnn]

I doubt the 1% ters even are aware that things are so bad that whole families are living in cars on the streets. It's scary outside of the gates.

It's not really the 1%- more like the .1%, and the .01% even moreso.

 

[Jhhnn]

No matter how much you spend on the poor they will want more and more.

That's unproven. Most of us give up greed at some level or another. What is proven is that the uber wealthy always want more.

 

[Ventanni]

Incidentally, that's 100% in line with Christian thinking, if you actually cared about that. Christianity is very, very explicitly against being and dying rich. Jesus couldn't be any clearer about the necessity of giving what you have to the poor throughout your life, but especially before you die. If you're actually a Christian, what do you care about estate taxes? No one should be rich at that point anyway, so estate taxes are completely irrelevant and will never come into effect.

This is not to draw this discussion off topic, but can you explain this one?

 

[Incorruptible]

No matter how much you spend on the poor they will want more and more.

Agree. Welfare needs to be cut instead of making them dependent on the government.

 

[Zaap]

Incidentally, that's 100% in line with Christian thinking, if you actually cared about that.

I'll never understand this line of "argument". Its weird on so many levels.

So everyone who has any money is a Christian? Further, they need big government power to enforce their religion (or better yet, someone else's!) for them in the form of confiscating their wealth?

What exactly is so noble about letting a giant monstrosity like the federal leviathon circle everyone's corpse like vultures and strip the dead clean of everything, so that a bunch of other rich people can make themselves even richer, reward their rich cronies, and create mountains more debt for everyone else? Yeah, yeah I know, we're pretending they don't do any of that and are just a big charity organization full of Mother Theresas that looooooooove the poor, but I mean in reality.

How about people being able to decide for themselves what's done with their life's fortune, not a bunch of "we're better and more important than everyone else" bunch of big govt busibodies?

 

[Greenman]

True enough. My point was calling out lowlifes that have made P&N such an unproductive landfill.

I'm going to go a bit off topic so I can ask a question about your first statement. When has P&N ever been anything but a partisan septic tank?
I've been around here a while, and it's always been a dump. Furthermore, I don't believe anything "discussed" here has, or ever will, make any measurable difference out in meat space. The only reason this area even exists is to limit the pollution in OT. We're all in here because our stench offends the people in the other sections.

We aren't changing the world, we aren't solving problems, we aren't contributing to the enlightenment of mankind. We're a finger pointing society, we're a bunch of kids saying "he started it". Most others think the best of us aren't qualified for the position of village idiot, and they're right. We're here to sneer at each other. The rare bit of real thinking is lost in the din of blaring stupidity we call discussion.

Of course this is just my opinion, I could be wrong.

 

[sandorski]

Can't provide help to prevent Homelessness, can't have Homelessness seen. aka, the Homeless ought to FOAD. That said, I don't think anyone really thinks that, they just wish to not have to deal with it at either end of the issue.

 

[Bowfinger]

I'm going to go a bit off topic so I can ask a question about your first statement. When has P&N ever been anything but a partisan septic tank?
I've been around here a while, and it's always been a dump. Furthermore, I don't believe anything "discussed" here has, or ever will, make any measurable difference out in meat space. The only reason this area even exists is to limit the pollution in OT. We're all in here because our stench offends the people in the other sections.

We aren't changing the world, we aren't solving problems, we aren't contributing to the enlightenment of mankind. We're a finger pointing society, we're a bunch of kids saying "he started it". Most others think the best of us aren't qualified for the position of village idiot, and they're right. We're here to sneer at each other. The rare bit of real thinking is lost in the din of blaring stupidity we call discussion.

Of course this is just my opinion, I could be wrong.

Oh, I agree P&N has always been a pit, but IMO it's far worse than it used to be. The noise level has always been high, but people who consistently contributed nothing but disruption and noise were a small minority, and were dealt with fairly quickly. Useful discussions -- signal -- often rose above the noise. P&N may have been a dysfunctional community, but it was still a community where one could actuially discuss and debate issues over a tempered background din.

That rarely seems to be the case today, and this thread was a good example of why. It offered a legitimate topic, there was nothing inherently partisan about it or the way it was posted, yet three P&N regulars immediately opened their rectums and started trashing the thread with purely partisan drek. They gave no pretense of on-topic discussion, just pure noise right out of the gate. And that's typical for them. Just noise. Even worse, their numbers continue to grow unabated. We have posters who drop literally thousands of worthless turdlets per year here while contributing absolutely nothing productive. Their din wins, drowning out most attempts at signal.

 

[Greenman]

Oh, I agree P&N has always been a pit, but IMO it's far worse than it used to be. The noise level has always been high, but people who consistently contributed nothing but disruption and noise were a small minority, and were dealt with fairly quickly. Useful discussions -- signal -- often rose above the noise. P&N may have been a dysfunctional community, but it was still a community where one could actuially discuss and debate issues over a tempered background din.

That rarely seems to be the case today, and this thread was a good example of why. It offered a legitimate topic, there was nothing inherently partisan about it or the way it was posted, yet three P&N regulars immediately opened their rectums and started trashing the thread with purely partisan drek. They gave no pretense of on-topic discussion, just pure noise right out of the gate. And that's typical for them. Just noise. Even worse, their numbers continue to grow unabated. We have posters who drop literally thousands of worthless turdlets per year here while contributing absolutely nothing productive. Their din wins, drowning out most attempts at signal.

And for all of that, the DC sits unused. It's there, an entire section devoted to real discussion, to getting at the root of an issue, and it's empty.
My opinion is that even the people with the lofty ideas and all the right answers aren't really interested in enlightenment. They want to point fingers and shout, they want to be RIGHT, they want agreement without argument and they desperately need to prove how stupid the other side is.

We're all equal in our bigotry and deluded belief that we have something worthwhile to say, and the proof of that is one section down. We don't want "discussion", we want to fight.

 

[Newell Steamer]

I doubt the 1% ters even are aware that things are so bad that whole families are living in cars on the streets. It's scary outside of the gates.

And, that is why the government needs to get invovled. They need to keep the poor away from the gates.

The government will be the gate, protecting the rich folk's gate.

 

[Bowfinger]

And for all of that, the DC sits unused. It's there, an entire section devoted to real discussion, to getting at the root of an issue, and it's empty.

DC is the victim of a catch-22. DC has to reach a certain critical mass in order to be useful, but it must be useful in order to achieve that critical mass. I still read DC and post when there's a topic that interests me, but the critical mass needed to sustain discussion isn't there.

I've also found that the signal quality in DC isn't really that much better than P&N. Agreed, it is not as noisy with insults, but the real problem of content -- logical fallacies, dishonest sources, factually supporting one's position, etc. -- is little better there than here. Further, even the insults are still there. They're simply a bit less overt. The three posts I objected to in this thread would all be acceptable in DC, as I understand it.

My opinion is that even the people with the lofty ideas and all the right answers aren't really interested in enlightenment. They want to point fingers and shout, they want to be RIGHT, they want agreement without argument and they desperately need to prove how stupid the other side is.

Often true, but I enjoy an intelligent, factually accurate, well-reasoned counter to my positions. Echo chambers are useless. For example, within the last month or so, on the topic of limiting money as free speech, someone posted a piece discussing how that could also impact newspapers and motion pictures since they can have political implications. It was a good point I hadn't considered, and I said so. I now see the issue as having substantially more grey than I did before.

We're all equal in our bigotry and deluded belief that we have something worthwhile to say, and the proof of that is one section down. We don't want "discussion", we want to fight.

Equal? Not at all. While we may all feel we have something worthwhile to say, some temper that with the recognition that our knowledge is incomplete and a recognition that others' opinions often offer insights that can enlighten. Others, unfortunately, are empty blowhards who remain proudly ignorant no matter how much information one offers. IIRC, it is Don Vito who has a great .sig about this.


Edit: DVC's .sig, from Yeats -- "The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity. The Second Coming, William Butler Yeats"

 

[unokitty]

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/apr/15/ban-sleeping-in-cars-homeless-silicon-valley



Don't like the homeless sleeping in automobiles? Don't worry, the government will take care of that eye sore for you,..

...the key to the system of corruption that has now wrecked our government is the way candidates for Congress raise money to fund their campaigns. Members of Congress and candidates for Congress spend anywhere between 30% and 70% of their time raising money to get themselves elected or their party back in power. But they raise that money not from all of us. Instead, they raise that money from the tiniest fraction of the 1%. Less than 1/20th of 1% of America are the “relevant funders” of congressional campaigns. That means about 150,000 Americans, or about the same number who are named “Lester,” wield enormous power over this government. These “Lesters” determine this critical first election in every election cycle—the money election. Without them, few believe they have any chance to win. And certainly, neither party believes it can achieve a majority without answering the special demands these “funders” make. Our Congress has thus become dependent upon these funders. In this sense, we are now “Lesterland.”
--L. Lessig

Congressional campaigns are financed by 1/20 of the 1%.

If you were one of those 150,000 Americans, you would expect the government to be responsive to your needs as well.

You don't think that they give all of that money to politicians, or political parties, because they like them do you?

Can anyone possible believe that the people that 'donated' the billion dollars to the current presidents campaign fund didn't expect something in return?

Uno

 

[glenn1]

And, uhh, what do Libertopians propose? I already pointed out that the Welfare State is a necessity under current economic conditions, just the way that the Job Creators! have made it. What should be done instead?

The government doesn't need to "just do something!" about every problem. Sure, you can set up more shelters and such but there's no way in a free society to "end" homelessness. Some people, for whatever reasons, will always choose to live at the margins of society. Others who aren't hardcore homeless and are just going through temporary hardships don't need the hassles of some city council passing "no car sleeping" laws and as a libertarian I think they're atrocious.

On the larger issue of homelessness, the typical talking points of both parties do pretty much nothing to help them. Whoop de fucking doo, so you support higher minimum wage - which is completely irrelevant to most of the people impacted by the law in this story. Ditto for the GOP parrots chanting "lower taxes!" and such.

Meanwhile things which really help go completely ignored in these discussions - for example, do you know that homelessness went down hugely due to the policies of George W. Bush? And that conservatives have come up with some turly innovative and effective ways to address the problem? Recently, even Obama is starting to catch on and adopt methods more likely to work than the typical Democratic approach of throwing money at the problem. The "diversion" approach in the former link is

Owning the executive branch doesn't appropriate funds. It doesn't hold unemployment insurance hostage to top tier tax cuts, either.

So what? Again, WTF does this have to do with the content of the story - a law specifically designed for nothing more than to harrass people down on their luck, passed by a Democratic city?

 

[sandorski]

Congressional campaigns are financed by 1/20 of the 1%.

If you were one of those 150,000 Americans, you would expect the government to be responsive to your needs as well.

You don't think that they give all of that money to politicians, or political parties, because they like them do you?

Can anyone possible believe that the people that 'donated' the billion dollars to the current presidents campaign fund didn't expect something in return?

Uno

300+ million should expect the US Government to be responsive to their Needs.