For those who assume supporting a Trump presidency over a Biden one means being a MAGA Trumper....

[Politruk]

Right and wrong is not determined by public opinion.

It is not determined by God's will either.

 

[JohnEngelman]

Orwell held an idealized version of democratic socialism, a utopian concept of it, and he didn't acknowledge the fact that it's also impossible so long as human nature is likely to take advantage and hurt and do damage to others. I never said I agree with Orwell's world view. I said when it came to his predictions of what your brand of socialism and Marxism does he got it dead on right.

Speaking only for myself, I do not want the government to own all businesses. I do want the government to move in a socialist direction with a more generously funded public sector of the economy, paid for with a more progressive tax system. Countries with universal health coverage spend less per capita than the American people. They have lower rates of child mortality and higher life expectancies.

 

[JohnEngelman]

Right and wrong is not determined by public opinion. It is determined by what is right and wrong. Oh, and I don't trust a thing. MSNBC NBC, CBS, ABC, NPR or Fox News says ever. Add CNN and any of the other so-called Legacy media sources you want to put in the mix. They are all corrupt and full of corrupt agendas and evil. They are lying organizations that if they report the sun is rising tomorrow I'm going to double check.

There are no objective criteria for determining right or wrong as there is for determining truth and falsehood. When someone says that something is "wrong" all that person is really saying is "I don't like it."

 

[JohnEngelman]

Whenever you get to the point of guaranteeing a new entitlement, no matter the entitlement, no matter how wrong-headed, people will become very upset if you take that entitlement away because you've created an entitlement mentality. That's exactly what happened with social security. We created an entitlement, we gave up the freedom and Liberty of investing our own money in the way we chose, we gave up the responsibility of doing the work and saving and doing what it takes to cover our own retirement, and instead put the responsibility of handling money and then taking care of our elderly on the government. A role the government was never designed or equipped to do. Of course it's a socialist program. The concept of the government taking care of the citizenry from the cradle to the grave is quintessentially socialist. The problem is that it's hard to touch that now because it has been entrenched. It doesn't make it right. It makes it a built-in problem.

When Social Security was begun it was intentionally redistributive. It was not intended to advance what you consider to be "freedom."

 

[JohnEngelman]

JaySecrets,

Political debates often resemble shouting matches between deaf people, because each side appeals to values and concerns the other side lacks.

I am not accusing you of relying on insults, name calling, and obscene words. I am saying that they have no place in a political debate.

 

[JohnEngelman]

with social security. We created an entitlement, we gave up the freedom and Liberty of investing our own money in the way we chose, we gave up the responsibility of doing the work and saving and doing what it takes to cover our own retirement, and instead put the responsibility of handling money and then taking care of our elderly on the government. A role the government was never designed or equipped to do. Of course it's a socialist program. The concept of the government taking care of the citizenry from the cradle to the grave is quintessentially socialist. The problem is that it's hard to touch that now because it has been entrenched. It doesn't make it right. It makes it a built-in problem.

Social security is socialist, and very popular. A large segment of the U.S. working population lives from pay check to paycheck, not because of extravagance, but because of low pay. A larger segment lacks the knowledge to invest wisely. The Stock Market is a prestigious form of gambling. No one can predict which stocks will rise and fall in the long run.

If you are as prosperous as your opinions indicate, I congratulate you. I also ask you to empathize with those less prosperous because they have been less fortunate.

 

[Politruk]

I also ask you to emphasize with those less prosperous because they have been less fortunate.

"Empathize."

 

[JohnEngelman]

"Empathize."

Thank you for correcting me.

 

[Politruk]

Social security is socialist, and very popular.

Socialism is not just any tax-funded government program or service. Socialism requires, at minimum, state ownership of some substantial part of the means of production.

 

[JaySecrets]

It is not determined by God's will either.

Oh, that's exactly who it's determined by. Without that, there is no objective standard. Not saying it's impossible for an atheist to be moral. I am saying he or she has no reason to be. If there's no standard, it's all subjective. You cannot give one reason why even rape, murder, incest, pedophilia, or genocide is always wrong. Not without appealing to an absolute standard. One you have no basis for without God.

 

[JaySecrets]

Oh and the labor unions and their ridiculous strikes when they were actually getting more and better benefits and pay than anybody else in the country, they destroyed my hometown. Their petulance and childishness is what ended up costing my hometown a well ensconced GM factory that was literally the hub of the local business community and the local economy. They drove them out of my home City because of what their strikes kept demanding beyond reasonable behavior. Do not tell me Unions are just gray and did just fine and didn't destroy anything. They are a nightmare that destroy economies and communities and eventually those businesses go to right to work states because they are sick and tired of people who did not build a business and do not lose anything except for a job that they can replace if that business goes under, them telling the business owners who actually lose everything what to do with their business. It's always a bad idea.

Look at the numbers. The budget. The actual results. Unions close businesses, drive up prices, force companies out of town or of the country in order to make a profit for their owners or investors. They kill jobs. They protect lazy workers. They punish employees who are loyal to a company instead of union thugs. They take money against employees will if the employees want a damn job, then give it to causes those employees don't support. They pressure free citizens to vote a socialist collective instead of their individual conscience. And their roots go back to mobs and communist organizers. And what happens to someone who disagrees with a strike, who tries to cross a picket line to go to work? They get hugs and encouragement or stitches? People have DIED because they were "scabs". You support Nazi socialist thugs who will beat people down and murder to protect their corrupt agendas... Who HAVE done such and been protected. But, yeah, they are such a benefit to America.

 

[Politruk]

Oh, that's exactly who it's determined by. Without that, there is no objective standard. Not saying it's impossible for an atheist to be moral. I am saying he or she has no reason to be. If there's no standard, it's all subjective. You cannot give one reason why even rape, murder, incest, pedophilia, or genocide is always wrong. Not without appealing to an absolute standard. One you have no basis for without God.

I think most believers would agree that nothing is good or bad because God says so; but, rather, when God says something is good or bad, we should listen because His judgment is better than ours.

The bad should never be defined as "what God doesn't like."

Although I know that some foolish churches do define "sin" as "any thought, word, deed or omission contrary to the will of God."

 

[JaySecrets]

But there was nothing "wrong-headed" in any of that. It works.

The numbers don't say that. SS is in SERIOUS trouble, and you are paying to support payouts now you will never see. Unless you are collecting. In which case you are stealing others money at this point. So proud of you.

 

[Politruk]

Look at the numbers. The budget. The actual results. Unions close businesses, drive up prices, force companies out of town or of the country in order to make a profit for their owners or investors. They kill jobs. They protect lazy workers. They punish employees who are loyal to a company instead of union thugs. They take money against employees will if the employees want a damn job, then give it to causes those employees don't support. They pressure free citizens to vote a socialist collective instead of their individual conscience. And their roots go back to mobs and communist organizers. And what happens to someone who disagrees with a strike, who tries to cross a picket line to go to work? They get hugs and encouragement or stitches? People have DIED because they were "scabs". You support Nazi socialist thugs who will beat people down and murder to protect their corrupt agendas... Who HAVE done such and been protected. But, yeah, they are such a benefit to America.

All of that is preferable to not having unions. Labor and management really do have opposed interests -- and unions are labor's only means of fighting back.

Everything that has gone wrong for American workers for the past 50 years has been due to the decline of unions.

Any enemy of organized labor is an enemy of humanity.

 

[Politruk]

The numbers don't say that. SS is in SERIOUS trouble, and you are paying to support payouts now you will never see. Unless you are collecting. In which case you are stealing others money at this point. So proud of you.

All projections of the SS system's insolvency are lies. And it never was a Ponzi scheme, that's a lie too.

 

[JaySecrets]

Socialism is not just any tax-funded government program or service. Socialism requires, at minimum, state ownership of some substantial part of the means of production.

What do you think the Left's agenda is? Elimination of private property. Government dependence from cradle to grave. And the supposed Right is worst. They follow communitarianism, a system that gives government control on the means of production. This is globalist socialism as promoted by the IMF, the UN, the EU, the WHO, and every other globalist power center that is the real power behind the establishment on the D or R side of the label. Welcome to the conversation.

 

[JaySecrets]

Speaking only for myself, I do not want the government to own all businesses. I do want the government to move in a socialist direction with a more generously funded public sector of the economy, paid for with a more progressive tax system. Countries with universal health coverage spend less per capita than the American people. They have lower rates of child mortality and higher life expectancies.

All of that is a lie

 

[Politruk]

All of that is a lie

"Countries with universal health coverage spend less per capita than the American people. They have lower rates of child mortality and higher life expectancies." That is not a lie.

 

[JaySecrets]

When Social Security was begun it was intentionally redistributive. It was not intended to advance what you consider to be "freedom."

Wealth redistribution is by definition unconstitutional and legalize theft that punishes those who work and prepare to give to the irresponsible and the lazy.

 

[Politruk]

What do you think the Left's agenda is? Elimination of private property.

Not in the social democracies, it isn't.

 

[Politruk]

This is globalist socialism as promoted by the IMF, the UN, the EU, the WHO, and every other globalist power center that is the real power behind the establishment on the D or R side of the label.

If only! All of those organizations are aggressively capitalist!

 

[JaySecrets]

"Countries with universal health coverage spend less per capita than the American people. They have lower rates of child mortality and higher life expectancies." That is not a lie.

They have RESPONSIBILITY TO DIE systems. Grandma gets drugs, not a heart transplant. And the medical SUCKS. I have the conversations with people in the UK, Canada, Sweden, and other countries who get screwed by those systems. Oh, and the greatest medical advances in the last century... From Israel and the US. You are an uninformed willing idiot.

 

[JaySecrets]

All projections of the SS system's insolvency are lies. And it never was a Ponzi scheme, that's a lie too.

You can't even be honest with yourself. Look at the damn numbers. Every honest accountant out there that does is appalled. Any business run like SS would be bankrupt and the owners in prison.

 

[JaySecrets]

If only! All of those organizations are aggressively capitalist!

You really are willfully blind. No wonder your side is being rejected by America.

 

[JaySecrets]

Not in the social democracies, it isn't.

They SAID SO IN A KEY DOCUMENT THAT WAS OPENLY OUT THERE UNTIL IT GOT EXPOSED!!!