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Should we pay for water?

Should we pay for water?


  • Total voters
    68
Every public utility in the US, water included, has state and federal programs for the indigent. I suggest you read your water bill.
 
The Marines
The Army
The Navy
The Air Force
NASA
NOAA

Your move. :)

If you honestly think the military is efficient than you have no idea what you are talking about. The military as a whole wastes more time,money and resources than you can imagine. Let me guess you have never been in the military have you
 
Is the supplying of water a basic human right?

If you consider all the things the gov't spends our money on (defense, roads, bridges, justice system etc), should one of them be a simple necessity?





Nearly Half Of Detroit Water Customers Can’t Pay Their Bill « CBS Detroit

Water is going to cost you money no matter how you get it. Dig a well. That will set you back about 8 grand. A water system has to be maintained and it takes money to maintain and run a water system. Of all the people on here, I think I may have the most appreciation for this because our 'community well' (water system) is old and falling apart. The operator is trying to get a grant to replace it with all new equipment, but in the mean time we have very sketchy service. I would dig a well, but I am located downhill from a cemetery and I really don't want to drink graveyard water.
 
Water is my cheapest bill. About $40 every two months.



I'mma say, in a sense Yes, having access to potable water is a basic human right, since you're dead in 3 days without it.

But if your income (from whatever source) is above the poverty line, you should be able to pay for reasonable water use.
 
If you honestly think the military is efficient than you have no idea what you are talking about. The military as a whole wastes more time,money and resources than you can imagine. Let me guess you have never been in the military have you

That's anti-American. ;)
 
Water is my cheapest bill. About $40 every two months.



I'mma say, in a sense Yes, having access to potable water is a basic human right, since you're dead in 3 days without it.

But if your income (from whatever source) is above the poverty line, you should be able to pay for reasonable water use.

Well, there WAS a time when we drank from water fountains and not plastic bottles we bought in a convenience store!
 
Without water, we cannot live. Therefore since we have a right to life we have a right to water.

The prohibition on collecting rainwater should be prohibited.


If you're not in a position to drop your own well, a "cost plus" method of delivery should be established in the locality in which you reside. The "plus" a minimal amount which covers the expenses of withdrawing, cleaning, distributing, and maintenance of infrastructure.

You cannot have a right to other people paying for something for you.

Just because something is required for living does not make it a right.

Rights are unalienable, inherent rather than parasitic.

If everything you needed was provided for you, at the expense of another's labor, why work? Your survival is not my problem, I do not live for your sake.


These two quotes, rightly understood, are not incompatible. You don't have an intrinsic right to someone delivering water to your home, but you do have a right to the water that falls from the sky, at a subsistence level. If someone is taking water that fell from the sky and not leaving enough for everyone's subsistence, then there is a conflict. A conflict which should resolve with the individual right trumping the business.
 
It is government that torments us. Government is broken.

The reason I brought this up, because if a major US city has half its population unable to afford basic water supply, it speaks to how broken our capitalist system is becoming.
Get a grip. What is broken is government. Nearly every ill flows from government that has lost its way. We have a Constitution to limit the interference of government in our lives and in our affairs. Too many of us are eager to throw away our individual rights, our freedoms, our liberty, as long as someone in government promises to plunder our neighbors to give us a few undeserved crumbs.

It is time to fix our broken government.
It is time to amend the Constitution in ways that will compel the Federal vermin to comply with the Constitution.
 
The Capitalist system is flailing on so many levels right now, the gov't can't provide funds fast enough. On one hand they're using the FED to pump $75 billion a month into the banking system and even more into social, safety net programs. We're losing the middle class faster than in the Great Depression and will have a large, working poor class juxtaposed against a super wealthy ruling class.

Can you say "Thank you president Obama"? He is at the center of the hope and change that is robbing you of your future.
 
These two quotes, rightly understood, are not incompatible. You don't have an intrinsic right to someone delivering water to your home, but you do have a right to the water that falls from the sky, at a subsistence level.

Rightly understood?

By who's standards?

:doh

Not!
 
You don't have an intrinsic right to someone delivering water to your home, but you do have a right to the water that falls from the sky, at a subsistence level.

There is a whole host of 'water' lawyers out there that would say you are wrong. And the water laws are insane. As I have mentioned before, there are places in the mountains here where it is illegal for you to collect snow out of your yard (for whatever reason) because some state down river has claim to that snow once it melts and runs off and runs through their state. It's pure insanity.
 
The reason I brought this up, because if a major US city has half its population unable to afford basic water supply, it speaks to how broken our capitalist system is becoming.

Or it speaks to how the 'poor' would rather have that fancy new smart phone with an expensive data plan that actually put their true needs first.
 
There is a whole host of 'water' lawyers out there that would say you are wrong. And the water laws are insane. As I have mentioned before, there are places in the mountains here where it is illegal for you to collect snow out of your yard (for whatever reason) because some state down river has claim to that snow once it melts and runs off and runs through their state. It's pure insanity.

I have heard about this from a colleague who lives near Denver. They have reasons for their insanity.
 
These two quotes, rightly understood, are not incompatible. You don't have an intrinsic right to someone delivering water to your home, but you do have a right to the water that falls from the sky, at a subsistence level. If someone is taking water that fell from the sky and not leaving enough for everyone's subsistence, then there is a conflict. A conflict which should resolve with the individual right trumping the business.

Take for instance not only the rainwater but aquafiers. Some places have demanded residents to fill their wells and link up to the main and pay for water. That company has no more right to that aquafier than the individuals sinking there wells but the coercive force of government actively denies them of what they've procured for themselves.
 
There is a whole host of 'water' lawyers out there that would say you are wrong. And the water laws are insane. As I have mentioned before, there are places in the mountains here where it is illegal for you to collect snow out of your yard (for whatever reason) because some state down river has claim to that snow once it melts and runs off and runs through their state. It's pure insanity.

I am not saying what the law is, but rather what the law ought to be. Subsistence is a birthright as far as I am concerned.
 
Take for instance not only the rainwater but aquafiers. Some places have demanded residents to fill their wells and link up to the main and pay for water. That company has no more right to that aquafier than the individuals sinking there wells but the coercive force of government actively denies them of what they've procured for themselves.

Fully agree.
 
I'd rather not pay for water.
 
I am not saying what the law is, but rather what the law ought to be. Subsistence is a birthright as far as I am concerned.

So you think it is your birthright to take the labor of others just because you need it to survive. Does that go for food to. Should farmers have to give you a portion of the food they grow because it is your birthright. What about heat in the winter. In some places you will die without heat. Should you get free electricity when ever it gets really cold. What about if your furnace breaks. You will freeze to death without it. Should someone have to food it for free for you. I mean subsistence is your birthright.
 
So you think it is your birthright to take the labor of others just because you need it to survive. Does that go for food to. Should farmers have to give you a portion of the food they grow because it is your birthright. What about heat in the winter. In some places you will die without heat. Should you get free electricity when ever it gets really cold. What about if your furnace breaks. You will freeze to death without it. Should someone have to food it for free for you. I mean subsistence is your birthright.

Reading comprehension is your friend. I stated, quite clearly, that we don't have the right to have water delivered to our us. Logically, if we don't have a right to have water delivered to us, then we don't have a right to someone else's labor. This should be doubly clear when you see where I said we have a right to a subsistence amount of the water that falls from the sky. So, taken all together: We have a right to it, but we have to use our own labor to collect it. Jeez.
 
some sort of independent commission should decide this.


Could be written off.


What about them?


They could buy access to a well.

Yes, wells are everywhere in big cities.

This is the problem with socialists: when you actually start asking questions and looking at simple scenarios, reality goes right out the window. There has never been a committee or five year plan that has been able to properly support a populace long-term. But you know what have given the greatest good to the greatest amount of people, repeatedly, throughout history since its inception?

The market.
 
Yes, wells are everywhere in big cities.
You can install a well or some sort of tank that holds large qunaitites of water or rent from a well.

This is the problem with socialists: when you actually start asking questions and looking at simple scenarios, reality goes right out the window. There has never been a committee or five year plan that has been able to properly support a populace long-term. But you know what have given the greatest good to the greatest amount of people, repeatedly, throughout history since its inception?
Uhhh.. You do realize many non-socialists hold this same idea right? Its not strictly a socialist idea.

The market.
What about it.
 
Re: It is government that torments us. Government is broken.

Get a grip. What is broken is government. Nearly every ill flows from government that has lost its way. We have a Constitution to limit the interference of government in our lives and in our affairs. Too many of us are eager to throw away our individual rights, our freedoms, our liberty, as long as someone in government promises to plunder our neighbors to give us a few undeserved crumbs.

It is time to fix our broken government.
It is time to amend the Constitution in ways that will compel the Federal vermin to comply with the Constitution.

I don't think amending the Constitution is needed. I'll admit that I'm knee-jerk leery of these because I remember the ERA "discussion," which is now being replayed over gays/LGBTs.

It does seem to me that that our individual rights and freedoms are eroding because they don't seem to matter much to so many. I know so few people who even pay attention, much less participate, in local affairs because they can't be bothered. They just don't care. They're disengaged.

And I'm talking about the people who earn livings, not about the 20-somethings who've looked me straight in the face when I've suggested job ideas and said, "But I don't like to work."

When did not working when you're able-bodied become an option? One of my young relatives by marriage (but not for much longer) is only 22 and will not work. He's decided that his "anxieties" and "anger management issues" qualify him for SS disability, and he has applied.

I think in some ways the federal government is "broken." But in some ways, we, the people, are increasingly broken ourselves.
 
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