Re: Minn. braces for shutdown at midnight; Democratic gov and GOP lawmakers at odds o
Perhaps you mean generating? Nobody "invented" electricity. Ben Franklin discovered conductivity, Edison discovered how to use it to generate light...either one of them received government money that I'm aware of. As for the rest of your post, I'm not responding to assumptions and generalizations because they're a waste of time and, quite frankly, you wouldn't listen anyway.
No, I meant inventing as in inventing electricity and electrical technology for the purpose of mass consumption. As for everything else I said, I am entitled to my opinion. This is debate thread after all. And how do the hell you know I wouldn't listen? As long as we stay on topic, then it's fair to discuss. If you want to turn this into a historical debate about my opinions then that wouldn't be on topic.
I did not say we can't compete with China. My point was that China is doing things the wrong way. They're investing in infrastructure but not in people. People suffer, infrastructure is going to waste, money is being wasted, and the people are no better for it. What does it matter if they have state of the art cities but nobody living in them??? To say "China's doing this and we should too" is a very generalized, vague argument.
I am cautious of entering a discuss if it starts out,
I didn't say this or that and
I refuse to discuss that, but oh well... what the hell. I just expect respect and no bull****. Your approach is you want an actual honest debate, so here it is. I expect the same.
I am not praising China or expecting anybody else too. China isn't perfect, but China is surpassing us and will in our lifetime. That is a fact. They are investing in the infrastructure and technology at a faster rate than us. You say China isn't doing it right, I won't debate that... your opinion. All I am saying is that America needs to invest in infrastructure to keep up with the rest of the world, to get off of foreign oil, and to have quality of life comparable to the rest of the world in the future. We can't afford to have the attitude that it isn't worth it. You seem to agree. Ok, next.
Should we invest in infrastructure? Sure! Should we penalize people do to it, like China does? Hell no! Should we create super state-of-the-art cities that nobody can afford to live in? Absolutely not!
I don't want to be like China... I want to be better than China.
When the money doesn't exist, changes have to be made. We can't keep paying for everything everybody wants when the money doesn't exist. Do you buy your son a brand new graphics computer for college at $1600 when the mortgage is due and you're $300 short? That computer would sure help him, but so does having a house. Tough decisions have to made by familes, and the government is no different. We can raise taxes every day on everybody above poverty but it won't solve the problem.
Cuts are necessary. Spending is out of control, and yet the problems still exist. Do you ever stop to ask why? Do you ever even consider the fact that maybe money isn't the biggest or even most important problem in poor performance? Do you ever consider that maybe, just maybe, we spend so much time focusing on their message of cuts and punishment of the poor for lack of resources that we're missing for the forest for the trees? We don't ask them to justify the spending because they've convinced us we need it. But are we seeing results?
You don't address generalizations, but you're full of them.
Yes, like you said, we have a host problems facing the country, long term and short term problems. The immediate concern in the recession, which isn't the same as the government spending money. We need to fix the recession first, then fixing government spending will be easier. We also need to change what we spend money on, and that is where the actual meat of the debate comes in.
The fact is once the nation gets employment rates back up, more people will be productive and the amount of people paying taxes will increase. The amount of people consuming goods in the free market will increase, so that will mean economic growth. Once we start getting economic growth, then meeting our debt obligations will be more practical.
Attacking public sector workers or shutting down the government like in Minnesota is not going to help the recession, the debt, or deficit. It will cost the state money, and firing public sector workers will put more people on unemployment and government assistance.
You're basically taking them off the government's right tit and putting them on the left.
The difference is when they are productive and working in the public sector, they are producing services and goods and being innovative, all of which has more positive ramifications on the private sector than sitting on the couch and collecting gov assistance.
Investing in the country is a long term position and will require spending.
The government employing people requires spending.
The government firing people requires spending.
If the government shuts down, it still costs money.
We put ourselves in the position to begin with... We spent on the wrong things. As long as we spend money and undertake massive investment projects there will be a debt and a deficit, but we should have a deficit that shows for something. Don't you agree?
I don't think spending on wars was a wise economic decision, nor is giving wealthy tax payers huge tax breaks along ON TOP OF giving middle income tax payers massive tax credits like EIC. All of this was during much the Bush Admin. Sure, the people are ****ing loving it up and they are spoiled, but it's simply not sustainable.
What the Bush Admin did was decide to not pay the mortgage and buy computers for all the kids. Now the kids are spoiled, and the GOP is too damn scared to put their damn foot down and say no, enough is enough.