Funny events in anti-woke world

Gordon_4

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It's the equivalent to saying a kid that got a 20 from their parents to see a movie (or whatever) paid for the movie. Where'd the money actually come from? It wasn't the kid. Just saying for the government to pay for something isn't some solution. You have to either move money from one thing to the thing you want or increase taxes (or whatever) to pay for it.
That metaphor is so off base its almost intellectually offensive, and frankly I'm a little mystified someone so proud of their intelligence would have made it. The second part is true; to pay for one thing money must usually be taken from another. That is simply an economic reality that you'll find most people capable of tying their shoe laces will understand. We get it; and your fellow countrymen get it. The devil in that detail is (and always has been) agreeing on where to take the money from.
 
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Agema

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Tbh am surprised you even clicked play on that one, of all people. Is a malfunctioning brain habit of mine when I start losing faith in self, mid-post...
Hey, no worries, post what you like - it's anyone else's responsibility whether they click play or not. And you're absolutely right, I normally avoid that stuff (because that sort of media so often is like what I criticised it over), but then, every once in a while...
 
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Agema

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How is that relevant ? Money circulates. If you pay for things, you also take money you got from somewhere like wage money or dividends or whatever. It is still you paying for those things, not your employer whom you got the money from.
I bought a chocolate bar from the supermarket. Except I didn't: I bought it with the money I got from my employer, which got its money from students by providing education, and the students paid for their education working a side job in the supermarket, so in fact the supermarket bought its own chocolate bar.
 

Seanchaidh

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Just saying for the government to pay for something isn't some solution. You have to either move money from one thing to the thing you want or increase taxes (or whatever) to pay for it.
Do you think a society should produce or acquire less food than it needs to feed all of its people? If not, then this is literally just a matter of the distribution of existing resources.
 

crimson5pheonix

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Man, clicking on a Phoenixmgs post to see what they're saying from time to time is wild. How do you people just not have him on ignore? It'd be like staring into a welding arc.
 

Phoenixmgs

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That metaphor is so off base its almost intellectually offensive, and frankly I'm a little mystified someone so proud of their intelligence would have made it. The second part is true; to pay for one thing money must usually be taken from another. That is simply an economic reality that you'll find most people capable of tying their shoe laces will understand. We get it; and your fellow countrymen get it. The devil in that detail is (and always has been) agreeing on where to take the money from.
Sure, technicalities-wise, the kid paid for it. But in reality, the parents did that worked to earn that money paid for it. Pandemic era policies did not take money from somewhere else or increase taxes for it either. Why would you choose to continue a program that isn't paid for?

Do you think a society should produce or acquire less food than it needs to feed all of its people? If not, then this is literally just a matter of the distribution of existing resources.
There's more food produced than needed already.

Man, clicking on a Phoenixmgs post to see what they're saying from time to time is wild. How do you people just not have him on ignore? It'd be like staring into a welding arc.
It's pretty wild that people here still think closing schools for 18 months was a good idea when you can just read about all the horrendous results of that.
 

Agema

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By the standard 6-3 conservative/liberal split, the Supreme Court of the United States declares that bribery is explicitly and federally legal as long as you cover it up even a tiny bit
To be fair, Clarence Thomas clearly thinks it's reasonable for to take gifts of $13,000 here and there, so maybe he just wanted equal opportunity of such largesse for everyone.
 
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Seanchaidh

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To be fair, Clarence Thomas clearly thinks it's reasonable for to take gifts of $13,000 here and there, so maybe he just wanted equal opportunity of such largesse for everyone.
Quite egalitarian when you think about it, yeah.
 
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The Rogue Wolf

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In the middle of this lengthy Time interview with convicted felon Donald Trump is a truly chilling opinion.


For an operation of that scale, Trump says he would rely mostly on the National Guard to round up and remove undocumented migrants throughout the country. “If they weren’t able to, then I’d use [other parts of] the military,” he says. When I ask if that means he would override the Posse Comitatus Act—an 1878 law that prohibits the use of military force on civilians—Trump seems unmoved by the weight of the statute. “Well, these aren’t civilians,” he says. “These are people that aren’t legally in our country.”
"Well, these aren't civilians. These are people that aren't legally in our country."
 

tstorm823

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That metaphor is so off base its almost intellectually offensive.
Every one of you playing dumb is intellectually offensive. You all fully understand the distinction between something being paid for by money gained through ones own labor and money gained through the labor of others (and in most other contexts, half of you would be crying to abolish the latter), and every one of you is playing dumb to take the piss out of someone who is basically right.
 
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Gordon_4

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Every one of you playing dumb is intellectually offensive. You all fully understand the distinction between something being paid for by money gained through ones own labor and money gained through the labor of others (and in most other contexts, half of you would be crying to abolish the latter), and every one of you is playing dumb to take the piss out of someone who is basically right.
I understand perfectly well how taxes work, thank you kindly. I may not understand every nuance of the Australian tax code but I am quite capable of internalising who pays for what. So when we say ‘the Government pays for this’, most of us are smart enough to know it’s our money; we’re telling the government to pull its finger out and make the purchase we want them to make with our dosh.
 
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tstorm823

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I understand perfectly well how taxes work, thank you kindly. I may not understand every nuance of the Australian tax code but I am quite capable of internalising who pays for what. So when we say ‘the Government pays for this’, most of us are smart enough to know it’s our money; we’re telling the government to pull its finger out and make the purchase we want them to make with our dosh.
Then you also understand that the list of reasons for the government to not pay for something is every other thing you might want the government to pay for. You can't understand how taxes work and then disregard someone who thinks maybe there's better things to fund than lunches for people who likely already have food.
 

Gordon_4

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Then you also understand that the list of reasons for the government to not pay for something is every other thing you might want the government to pay for. You can't understand how taxes work and then disregard someone who thinks maybe there's better things to fund than lunches for people who likely already have food.
I didn’t disregard him. I just thought his analogy was stupid. I also put my oar in about how governments obtained funding prior to the implementation of income taxation. Getting between that long running lover’s tiff is not my idea of stimulating conversation.

For what it’s worth I am of the opinion that free lunches should be a big part of school funding spending, but I get it’s expensive as hell and a nutritional balance nightmare.
 
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Satinavian

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Every one of you playing dumb is intellectually offensive. You all fully understand the distinction between something being paid for by money gained through ones own labor and money gained through the labor of others (and in most other contexts, half of you would be crying to abolish the latter), and every one of you is playing dumb to take the piss out of someone who is basically right.
No, most of us very well understand that the government money is in essence money belonging to the citizens, the community and is to be used for things the citizens want to collectible pay for.

But we also think that school lunches should be such a thing (similar to the schools themself). That this is a good use of common money and well worth higher taxation.


It is just another iteration of the "small government debate". A lot of people would be happy with way higher taxes and particularly way higher redistributions than the current US system has. Particularly those of us happily living in countries the US right regularly smears as "socialist".
 
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Satinavian

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In the middle of this lengthy Time interview with convicted felon Donald Trump is a truly chilling opinion.

"Well, these aren't civilians. These are people that aren't legally in our country."
To be fair, he is probably just too stupid to understand the difference between civilian and citizen.
 

Agema

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Every one of you playing dumb is intellectually offensive.
The idea "It's not the government's money it's the taxpayers' money" (in whatever form) invites idiocy.

As the most general principle that government should have a duty to use taxpayers' money wisely, okay. But it's often employed in bone-headed or ill-considered arguments, or even to simply argue government should reduce taxes, often irrespective of any other principles about government action.

Anyone can say that they earned that money from their labour and the government took it, but their ability to earn is dependent on a whole host of protections, facilities and processes (military, law, public infrastructure) provided the government. As a parallel, so too do corporations requisition a proportion of the value that their workers create in return for facilitating work. I wonder how many people roll this shit out against governments, but not business?