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“Are you suggesting a bunch of Corporations have ganged up to rule the world?” They have common interests that they advocate for using industry organizations. Because of their unrivaled financial power they usually get what they want. The same is true with rich individuals and dynasties.
Government Budgets
When budgets are tight, politicians tend to cut those government services that impact a large number of people first, so that the public will be willing to agree to a tax increase in response.
Planned Parenthood Fetal Tissue “Scandal”
Who did PP harm? As long as no one is forcing or encouraging abortions in order to procure organs, there is no harm and no immorality.
“When Does Human Life Begin?” is the Wrong Question
The better question is: “When should the protections, rights and privileges of citizenship (humanity) be given to a fetus or child?” That should happen when the fetus or child is able to breathe and eat/drink normally. Until that point they are a parasite that is not entitled to human rights because the rights of the host have priority. If someone can not breath or eat they are either in the womb getting nourished by the mother, they are in a medical device for life support or they are dead or dying. If they aren't dead it is because someone is caring for them.
Third Party Presidential Candidates
The way our elections are rigged, a vote for a third party is a vote for the Republican.
Crazy Candidates
A while ago, people used to laugh at that crazy, but charismatic, painter with extremist "politically incorrect" views and considered him harmless since no one with half a brain would ever vote for a nut like him.
This time, the nut has many millions available to spend on his campaign
Protect the Children?
I don't believe the completely unproven claim that children's casual exposure to nudity and/or sexual material is harmful. The motive of most parents who are concerned about exposure is to avoid an uncomfortable conversation with their kids. That conversation is so hard for most parents because they haven't resolved the conflicts between their own beliefs on sexual issues and their actual behavior. The root of of the problem is that most people's religions are hostile to healthy sexuality. (religions hate the competition and want people to sublimate their sexual energy and direct it into devotion to the church.
Health and Welfare
Healthy educated people contribute more in taxes and improve society in numerous ways. Creating a situation where every child reaches adulthood healthy and well educated, no matter their parent's income and wealth, race, nationality, religion etc is a worthwhile and achievable goal that will strengthen our society.
Science vs. Superstition
Science is not closed minded. Any phenomena that can be tested, observed and repeatedly verified will be accepted as fact. That is how we discovered 'magical' phenomena like magnetism, electricity and radiation.
We should not believe any claim of knowledge, healing ability, extraordinary abilities or existence of 'supernatural" phenomena that can not be tested and verified. Swindlers steal millions every year from the gullible and many animals are being hunted to extinction due to superstitions. Until recently, due to the retirement of the Amazing Randi, there was a million dollars waiting for someone who "... can demonstrate a supernatural or paranormal ability under agreed-upon scientific testing criteria. ..." Wikipedia The offer was first made n 1964 and no one has collected.
Read all about it, including who has refused to be tested.
Note: If a phenomena or ability is so inconsistent and fragile that it can not be tested, then it is not consistent or reliable enough to be useful or for anyone to accept it with a rational justification.
The Conspiracy
Our resident armchair climate scientists know far more about interpreting data than those 'scientists' with their fancy degrees (which just prove that they have been brainwashed by the cult of global warming). Thousands of scientists, environmental groups and politicians have conspired to ruin our economy and enslave us with communism under the guise of the global warming scare. Thank god we have our resident armchair climate scientists and the oil company's front groups around to expose the truth, they know a lot more than a bunch of so-called experts. (Pay no attention to the fact that those same oil companies are making plans for oil exploration in previously unreachable places expected to be accessible in the near future as polar ice melts.)
Facts in Conflict
We don't just have a conflict of opinions in the USA, we have people forming opinions based on different sets of facts. We now have a mainstream, academic and science based facts on one side and we have a wide assortment of half truths, religious beliefs, intentional misrepresentations, misunderstandings and misinterpretation of facts on the other. The second side is the less educated one that still considers many religious and superstitious claims factual and has a great distrust of science and academics, yet are gullible about believing politicians, select partisan media outlets and rumors. Never before has there been such a well organized campaign to mislead people. (ie. Fox News and various Koch funded campaigns) A major cable network and a whole industry of lobbyists, PR professionals and bogus 'think tanks' and advocacy groups serve to continually disinform the ignorant and gullible. No wonder we can't find much common ground.
Schools need to Face the New Realities of Family Life
Schools need to face the reality that families are not like they were assumed to be in the past. Schools should work with the assumption that kids do not have a family capable of supporting the child's educational efforts and plan accordingly, unless there is evidence otherwise for particular children.
It is easier to change schools than all of society. Changing society as you wish has many downsides (like being oppressive) and is likely to be resisted. There is also the fact that many households that appear ideal still have problem children, and many unconventional households have successful kids.The days of stay at home mothers are over thanks to the state of the economy. Poor people never lived the lives that are ideal due to lack of resources and the instability and mental issues caused by poverty.
Do Teachers Get Paid Enough?
In my experience, most teachers are not very good and too many students are allowed to fail by our educational system, so I say no, we are not paying enough to attract really good teachers. We should raise the standards for teachers and pay more. That doesn't mean that teachers should be evaluated on test scores alone. Also, the pay should be higher for teachers working with more challenging students (ESL, low income etc.)
Equality and the Political Spectrum
"The more a person deems absolute equality among all people to be a desirable condition, the further left he or she will be on the ideological spectrum. The more a person considers inequality to be unavoidable or even desirable, the further to the right he or she will be." Stackelberg, Roderick Hitler's Germany, Routledge, 1999
This statement is more true than most right wingers will admit. In my view, 'absolute equality' as intended in the quote above and as understood by those leaning left, refers to equal treatment under the law and in the public sphere. (ie. in businesses and most other institutions) It does not mean that all people actually have equal abilities or that all outcomes of competitive situations need to be equal, they just need to be fair. "Absolute equality' means judging and treating people as individuals, not just as members of a group.
Fact: Nazis and Fascists Were Nearly All Christian
Despite the bogus claims of Christian revisionits, which are based solely on hearsay evidence published after the war, Nazism was sold and accepted by the people of Germany as a Christian movement. Hitler considered Jesus a role model for his persecution of Jews, Nazism was sold to the German people and accepted as a Christian belief system, including by many religious leaders. Nazi uniforms contained the slogan "God is with us." The fact that some Nazi officials are said to have expressed cynicism about religion in private conversations (which were not made public until after the war) doesn't change the fact that Nazism was a Christian movement. Those who Claim otherwise are often guilty of the "No True Scotsman" logical fallacy.
Prison Labor
I do not object to prison labor as long as all the labor laws for non-prisoners, including minimum wage, are enforced. Otherwise, there is too much of an incentive to incarcerate more people to provide cheap labor to corporations.
Here's some relevant history that is not well known:
"Convict leasing in the United States began during the Reconstruction Period (1865–1877) after the end of the Civil War,... Farmers and businessmen needed to find replacements for the labor force once their slaves had been freed. Some southern legislatures passed Black Codes to restrict free movement of blacks and force them into employment with whites. If convicted of vagrancy, blacks could be imprisoned, and they also received sentences for a variety of petty offenses. States began to lease convict labour to the plantations and other facilities seeking labor, as the freedmen were trying to withdraw and work for themselves. This provided the states with a new source of revenue during years when they were financially strapped, and lessees profited by the use of forced labor at below market rates.[5]
Essentially, both black legislators and whites in the criminal justice system colluded with private planters and other business owners to entrap, convict, and lease blacks as prison laborers
Corruption, lack of accountability, and racial violence resulted in "one of the harshest and most exploitative labour systems known in American history."[2] African Americans, mostly adult males, due to “vigorous and selective enforcement of laws and discriminatory sentencing,” made up the vast majority—but not all—of the convicts leased.[3]
...The writer Douglas A. Blackmon described the system: ”…It was a form of bondage distinctly different from that of the antebellum South in that for most men, and the relatively few women drawn in, this slavery did not last a lifetime and did not automatically extend from one generation to the next. But it was nonetheless slavery – a system in which armies of free men, guilty of no crimes and entitled by law to freedom, were compelled to labour without compensation, were repeatedly bought and sold, and were forced to do the bidding of white masters through the regular application of extraordinary physical coercion..." Wikipedia
New Technology, Automation and Jobs
Machines should be making all of our lives easier and better, not just the elites. Otherwise we will have too many idle people to sustain if the trends towards increased automation continue.
All workers should be given shorter work weeks and more sick/vacation time off without a pay decrease. We can double the demand for workers by having two or more equal work "weeks" within seven days. For example some people might work a 28 hour week Sunday through Wednesday at noon, while others work Wednesday afternoon through Saturday. People with more time off will spend more, stimulating the economy.
Determining how to make the transition to such a system without too much disruption and how to structure the costs to avoid making people poorer are the hard part, but it can.
Colleges and Rape Accusations
School administrators and their employees shouldn't be playing cop, judge and jury. The real police and justice system should be handing these cases, they should have the expertise. If the local law enforcement system can't handle it, that problem should be addressed rather setting up a parallel system of justice.
Schools don't have forensic labs, investigating detectives, etc, they do not have legitimate courts with all of the practices intended to maintain fairness and neutrality and they do not require that the accused has access to legal representation.
Incidents of campus misconduct that are not serious enough to routinely result in a criminal charge or a citation over $500 are appropriately handled by the school administration (when a perpetrator is caught). Use of alcohol, possession of drugs for personal use, verbal abuse, public intoxication and minor groping can be handled by the schools. Felony theft, threats of violence, assault and rape should be handled by police and prosecutors. Students can be suspended until the criminal charges are resolved, but if they are not convicted they should be reinstated with no black marks on their record from the criminal proceedings.
"...Most reports of sexual assault on campus are dealt with through binding administrative actions, such as no¬contact orders.
An information¬gathering or investigative process is used at only one¬fourth of schools overall, only onefourth of 4¬year private nonprofit schools, and less than half of 4¬year public schools.
Due process for the accused is guaranteed in fewer than 40 percent of schools that have disciplinary procedures.
In about 80 percent of schools, the body that decides whether the student code of conduct has been violated is the disciplinary board. In just over half the the schools, this body also decides what sanction will be imposed...." NCJRS Report
Police Misconduct
I support the idea of electing police chiefs. Elected Sheriff's departments don't seem to have as many community relations problems and officer misconduct issues as police departments.
I would be more supportive of the police if their unions and other organizations didn't advocate for positions and laws that are contrary to the public interest and show disregard for our rights. One example: police opposition to regulations to insure that witness identification of suspects is done fairly and accurately as possible.
It is their right, but these police organizations are harming their relationship with the community when they oppose well-considered reforms based on extensive research to address a significant problem. In most jurisdictions they have opposed virtually every attempt to improve the quality of their work. It indicates that they are completely ignoring all public concern about how police misconduct, corruption and poor performance impacts our quality of life. They are collectively choosing to prevent improvements to policing by giving priority to protecting bad cops and bad police practices. If they want more respect from the community, they should give some respect.
ATT Is Particularly Evil
ATT is a particularly evil company that should be boycotted, especially their Uverse product. They are blatantly violating the law but no one has the power or will to enforce it.
"PEG channels—public, educational, and government programming that generally takes the form of city council meetings and plays from the local middle school—are being treated as second-class citizens on AT&T's new U-Verse IPTV system, according to a new complaint to the FCC. Anger over AT&T's PEG handling has been buildling for some at the local level, but late last week it went national.
The FCC is now being asked to step in where state regulators so far have not to "rule in no uncertain terms" that the U-Verse PEG situation is "in violation of the Act and Commission rules and policies."
Everyone agrees on what's happening here, just not on whether it's a "feature" or a "bug." Instead of providing each PEG channel with an actual "channel" that subscribers can simply punch into a remote or surf past on accident, AT&T has bundled all the PEG channels from a broad area and dumped them onto channel 99. Users who want to see that city council meeting need to visit channel 99, click "OK," download a small app (from eight seconds to one minute), choose their community from a list of local towns, then choose a particular PEG channel from that community.
This PEG ghetto comes with consequences beyond inconvenience; second audio channel (SAP) programming is allegedly stripped, closed captioning text is not carried correctly, and users are unable to record the material using DVRs......"FCC asked to probe AT&T treatment of public access channels | Ars Technica)
I don't love Comcast, but they are not nearly as sleazy (and powerful) as ATT.
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