I would affirm it is.

<My intention is to pose you a question: would you rather pay for an illegitimate child's basic needs today, or for his custody tomorrow? >

I'd rather pay for his needs today. A question for you: What happens when you spend more money today on ________ than you did yesterday? To save time in the discussion, I will scroll down a few lines and give my answer. See what you come up with before reading it.

**********
**********

**********
**********

**********
**********

Today is a big day in Congress.
Maybe not THE big day, but big all the same. Are there enough votes to pass health care without an abortion admendment?? We will see. It is close.

I figured that was coming.

When people talk about right to life, it's in terms of the fetus, right? Not the parents. And it's not the fetus or the baby having irresponsible sex, is it?

We could all of us be on the street corners begging for help. This is one society in the world that has begun life with the premise that, if you can find a way to succeed by selling goods, services, or your time to others they are willing to pay for, then we will let you do so...go for it and good luck.

Now that some have really succeeded, a new generation wants to renege on the promise of this new society, and say..."Wait! You can't have your success...you stole it from all these others, and you owe it to them to help out!"

It is my contention that if you change the terms of success here, you will destroy the chances of any of us...including a currently homeless man...of ever succeeding.

I am a firm believer in the premise that the best, brightest, most determined...even (yes) the greediest...can enrich us all with their contributions to a better way of life for all. Better travel means. Better home heating means. Better communication means. Better hygene and health means. Interpose the govt far enough in these attempts, and they ALL DIE ON THE VINE.

That's largely why African countries have such a hard time of it. Any time a group of achievers really get going, they become targets, and eventually stripped of whatever they achieved. The only way around that is to have a strong tribe who will defend and support you in a position of governmental power. Therefore, the only place to be a great success in African countries (for the most part) is to be a strong and powerful political figure, in a position to take from any other achievers who pop up in the country.

The USA would be the same type of place if the Power-hungry Democrats were allowed to rule uninhibited.

They want Big Oil in their pocket. They want Big Manufacturing in their pocket. They want all endeavor to be attributable, and payable, to them. Big Govt wants to be in charge of the New Energy. They want to set ALL the rules, conduct ALL the trade, get ALL the credit (in their stupidity they think there will be some to be had). And let's certainly not forget Big Medicine. That juicy plum of a treasure trove is on the verge of being pried open by the Democrats, ready to be leeched dry of its lifeblood for the good of the newly redisigned vampire society and their Newly Powerful Royalty!

You may shortly see once proud medical professionals on the street corners, as the private hospitals close for lack of profit.

She was news.

<Keith Dow>
<The upper class is getting way too much money>

That's nothing a little state-sponsored theft can't solve, right?

=====

Actually it was state sponsored theft that gives it to them. Remember privatize the profits and socialize the losses? $10,000 per person was sucked out of everyones wallets and sent to the rich to fix their latest fiasco. The super wealthy have gamed the system. For example NewsCorp pays no income tax. You, the average sucker has to pay their share of military spending, etc. NewCorp owns Fox. So Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity are corporate welfare babies with NewsCorp being a welfare mom who sucks money out of you to pay for their share of government. You know they use the FCC, etc. don't you?

=====

<we aren't investing enough in education> We invest too much in terms of actual money. We just dump it down the wrong hole: State schools.

=====

Rubbish. Universities have cut way back on classes and students have suffered.

=====

<we aren't investing enough in science or technology> As if that would solve anything.

=====

I am sure the U.S. would have done better to fight WWII with WWI technology.

Since about 60% of our economy is based on new technology, who needs an economy?

=====

<the Democrats aren't exactly that great at problem solving either. However they are better than the Republicans.>

Nope. They're about the same. They're just wrong for a few different reasons. A very few different reasons.

=====

Hardly. Obama is fact based and Bush was faith based. Unfortunately for Bush reality is an atheist.

====

<Somewhere around 2025 China will become the largest economy. They will be spending more on education, science, technology and research than us and slowly pull away>

China's at least a century away from becoming the dominant cultural influence of the world. Yes, their economy grows rapidly, but it needs our consumer spending to make it happen and that's in a long-term slowdown that has just barely gotten started. These people feed their families on gardens the size of a twin bed, and they live in huts and shanties. They have a long, long way to go.

=====

We compete against people who work in buildings. Lets look at the ten tallest buildings.

China has six in the top ten and the U.S. has one. In fact Asia has nine out of the top ten. Pretty soon people will be asking, the United States who? China builds a city the size of Houston every month. They have been doing so for years. They will be doing even more in the future.

Taiwan 1 Taipei, Taiwan 2003 509 m

China 2 Shanghai, People's Republic of China 2008 492 m

Malaysia 3= Malaysia 1998 452 m
Malaysia 3= Malaysia 1998 452 m

China 5 Nanjing, People's Republic of China 2009 450 m

U.S. 6 Chicago, United States 1974 442 m

China 7 Shanghai, People's Republic of China 1998 421 m

China 8 , Hong Kong 2003 415 m

China 9 People's Republic of China 1997 391 m

China 10 Shenzhen, People's Republic of China 1996 384 m

=====

<Too bad conservative Republicans don't have a clue about reality>

Or the democrats either.

=====

Obama is far superior to Bush.

=====

Unless America wakes up and re-discovers the concept of respect for the individual, we're goners. And that is the one area where at least in terms of lip-service, the republicans have the dems whipped eight ways of sunday. It's just too bad they don't really believe in it any more.

=====

Do you go to a doctor because of his "concept of individual"? No. The ideas that Republicans throw around are often simpleton stories to manipulate the unsophisticated. Listen to Reagan's speech against Medicare. When he became president did he get rid of it? No. Reagan was as phony as it comes. Real analysis of problems is done with mathematics, not fairy tale stories.

Been watching C-Span.

Looks good for health care reform.

4 hours debate and 3 votes to go.

<My friend Colin Campbell, an American writer, has been in the Netherlands for four years with his wife and their two children. “Over the course of four years, four human beings end up going to a lot of different doctors,” he said. “The amazing thing is that virtually every experience has been more pleasant than in the U.S. There you have the bureaucracy, the endless forms, the fear of malpractice suits. Here you just go in and see your doctor. It shows that it doesn’t have to be complicated. I wish every single U.S. congressman could come to Amsterdam and live here for a while and see what happens medically.”

I’ve found that many differences between the American and Dutch systems are more cultural than anything else. The Dutch system has a more old-fashioned, personal feel. Nearly all G.P.’s in the country make house calls to infirm or elderly patients. My G.P., like many others, devotes one hour per day to walk-in visits. But as an American who has been freelance most of his career, I find that the outrageously significant difference between the two systems is the cost. In the United States, for a family of four, I paid about $1,400 a month for a policy that didn’t include dental care and was so filled with co-pays, deductibles and exceptions that I routinely found myself replaying in my mind the Monty Python skit in which the man complains about his insurance claim and the agent says, “In your policy it states quite clearly that no claim you make will be paid.” A similar Dutch policy, by contrast, cost 300 euros a month (about $390), with no co-pays, and included dental coverage; about 90 percent of the cost of my daughter’s braces was covered.>

And I thought this was interesting:

Again, you amaze me with how much page space you hog to say so very little. It's bad manners as it makes it harder for others to refer back to above posts when you use half a page to make a few small points. Oh well. The left has never been too concerned with civil conduct anyway so I suppose I should expect it by now.

<Actually it was state sponsored theft that gives it to them>

This is very often correct.

The state always makes it easier to steal, and they make it legal too.

<You, the average sucker has to pay their share of military spending>

The average sucker is the guy who fails to realize that regardless of who sits in the White House, we continue to have military spending to pay for. You must have me confused with someone else.

<NewCorp owns Fox. So Glenn Beck, Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity are corporate welfare babies with NewsCorp being a welfare mom who sucks money out of you to pay for their share of government>

This is obvious. Another example of the way that special interests exploit the rest of us through the manipulation of the state.

Why do you keep assuming that I support the mainstream right-wing element? Don't you read my stuff?

<Obama is fact based and Bush was faith based>

So what? They both still serve the same basic function. They expand the state, thereby creating more new ways for people to use the state against others.

So China builds lots of skyscrapers. Again, so what? The Egyptians built pyramids and where are they now?

I acknowledged already that their economy grows rapidly. More importantly, you failed to see my point. China does not export its culture to the west. My argument was that China has a century to go before they move into a culturally dominant global role.

Furthermore, if the US collapses as I suspect it might, there will be nobody to buy China's exports. If the US goes down in flames, it will hurt China as much or more than us here and they'll be knocked back even further.

<Reagan was as phony as it comes>

Agreed. Like all modern state leaders are. Including the ones you vote for (if you vote).

<Real analysis of problems is done with mathematics, not fairy tale stories.>

Analysis of problems is properly done through the application of consistent, principled, political/economic theory.

Ahh, a fresh young mind!

I must say that I'm somewhat surprised and extremely pleased to learn that a recent college graduate such as yourself has not swallowed the government-is-the-answer-to-everything pill. I would think that your views were on the endangered species list around campus, no?

Good for you. Please, never stop thinking for yourself.

Now on to the meat and potatoes:

<As far as government money for education goes, I'm in favor of it for those who are motivated>

I can empathize with your first statement. I think all here would agree that education, or at least the acquisition of knowledge and skills (there is a difference, of course) is valuable. And there are many gifted people who lack the necessary financial resources to pursue higher education in a university setting.

And society has come together with a remedy for this as there are many charitable organizations dedicated to making it possible for those without the funds to make their scholastic aspirations attainable.

Some here of course will argue that charity isn't enough, but the problem with forcibly taking from one to give to another, regardless of the grounds upon which you justify the theft, is that it's still theft.

<The notion of free university education for all is a naive and unsound one>

Now here I totally agree.

The catch is, once you make the justification for the first notion, you've opened the way for the justification for the other.

And that's the problem with all state-run redistributive policy.

People who think that they know better how to spend the money of others decide that this knowledge also grants them the authority to coercively institute their ideas into universal practice. Universal, that is, except for them of course. All animals are created equal, but some are more equal.

As long as we make the looting possible through state endorsement of such theft, there will forever be countless competing interests fighting over the stolen money like hyenas tearing a dead baby gazelle limb from limb.

Good evening, good sir.>

'mornin'

<As you can see, I'm at it again-throwing bombs and taking arrows as ever.>

Ha ha! You mean you're as annoying as ever? Quite so, but I still love you.

<Little Wyatt is doing well and keeping me away from the forums>

Good to see father and daughter doing well.

<but I have flagrantly defied she who must be obeyed for the evening.>

The bath tub for you!

<How are you?>

Undoubtedly, the problem is cultural. Those who exploit welfare without making a serious attempt to support themselves and instead squander their checks on temporary luxuries (volunteering has exposed me to anecdotal evidence of this) exhibit an inability to pursue true satisfaction. This misconception occurs not only in the poor but in every socioeconomic category in the US, which I think explains the decrease in "life satisfaction" and increase in clinical depression that has occured in the United States despite an overall trend economic growth (from the 1950's to the 1990's.)

One of the sources of this misconception in my opinion is the influence of advertisment, which seeks to connect material wealth with happiness in order to coerce consumption. For the poor who exploit welfare, this could come in the form of alcohol/tobacco advertising, but at my work (serving free dinner at a community center) I have overheard conversations about "RAZR phones" and "plasma TV's."

"<Keith Dow>
... Oh well. The left has never been too concerned with civil conduct anyway so I suppose I should expect it by now."

So you are a right winger.

"<You, the average sucker has to pay their share of military spending>

The average sucker is the guy who fails to realize that regardless of who sits in the White House, we continue to have military spending to pay for. You must have me confused with someone else."

I am afraid this point zoomed over your head. It was not about paying for a military, but who paid for it. There is a difference between money out of my pocket and money out of your pocket.

"Why do you keep assuming that I support the mainstream right-wing element? Don't you read my stuff?"

Fox and gang are extremists. However you are clearly a right winger.

"<Obama is fact based and Bush was faith based>

So what? They both still serve the same basic function. They expand the state, thereby creating more new ways for people to use the state against others."

I guess you are slightly paranoid.

"So China builds lots of skyscrapers. Again, so what? The Egyptians built pyramids and where are they now?"

The U.S. building is 35 years old and all the Chinese buildings are less than 15. I wonder who is in decline and who is ascending?

"I acknowledged already that their economy grows rapidly. More importantly, you failed to see my point. China does not export its culture to the west. My argument was that China has a century to go before they move into a culturally dominant global role."

Who cares about culture? "It is the economy stupid!" Let me guess, you have a degree in humanities.

"Furthermore, if the US collapses as I suspect it might, there will be nobody to buy China's exports. If the US goes down in flames, it will hurt China as much or more than us here and they'll be knocked back even further."

When China becomes number 1, we won't be their major trading partner. We are in the process of becoming puny and irrelevant. Again, "It is the economy stupid."

"<Real analysis of problems is done with mathematics, not fairy tale stories.>

Analysis of problems is properly done through the application of consistent, principled, political/economic theory.

Mathematics is not morality."

I can't think of two worse areas to build anything on than political and economic theory. The Bush Presidency came out of "the application of consistent, principled, political/economic theory." Tom Coburn wanted to cut out all funding for political science because it is useless. The New York times had a recent article which asked if political science is useless.

the lifespan of canadians equal the americans right?

i got a healthcard from the government plus a private medical insurance from my work, god forbids i get sick but i think im covered.