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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Jamie153 who wrote (1297297)	4/9/2021 12:56:10 PM
From: IC720	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1575803

No one saying socialism doesn't work....having been unable to control Trump. plus NWO, Leftist Universities-Media brainwashing, China buying hollywood, entertainment, Sports, politicians, It's been...HEY let's do total!.......read few more times.. "As I see it, we need to go "backwards," not "forward": We need to take back some of our power, not give up more of it. That, to me, would be truly progressive. that is precisely what's destroying us. "More socialism" isn't the answer, it's the very problem. The road forward is to empower the people, which is what capitalism does. Socialism does the opposite: It steals power from the people and gives that power to the elite -- under the guise of "giving" to the people. The more power you give the Feds, the less power you and I (and our children) will have. Sure, capitalism has problems. But that doesn't mean another system won't end up creating even more problems. Least of which, capitalism is the only system that isn't linked to the government (socialism is), and I tend to be very, VERY skeptical of the government's ability to manage anything. Freedom always comes with problems. In prison, you get three square meals a day and have all your basic needs met, including medical -- but no way in hell I would ever voluntarily make that trade. With socialism, once we've given that power up, then (just like with the Fed), we ain't getting it back. Better we keep it, problems and all. Millennials are the first generation in American history to have a net positive view of socialism. Remember that politics is downstream from culture. Don't get me wrong, I'm NOT advocating for total anarchy. I agree that some government is necessary. The government stepping in and saying, "Hey, you can't do stuff that harms others" is sometimes necessary. The government stepping in and saying, "Hey, we're going to take 50% (or more) of the fruits of your hard work and spend it however as WE see fit," is a bridge too far, though. Which brings to mind the funny thing about Millennials and socialism -- they always assume they'll be in that tiny, tiny percentage of people who end up on the net receiving end of the programs, not the huge percentage of people that get shafted (who put in more than they take out, like most of us are doing with Social Security even as we speak) and who have to do the actual work.

To: Jamie153 who wrote (1297297)	4/9/2021 1:31:16 PM
From: IC720	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1575803

Another thought regarding socialism.. PC, But how did we get here? Companies are responding to flawed legislation that itself is corrupt. The ACA was a partisan co-op with industry similar to the mlb All-Star fiasco and all the rest. It had a significant impact on part-time/benefits incentives. Surprise that a big chunk of the Obama-era jobs growth was part-time and seniors. Our partisan politicians have passed laws that incentivize being unemployed. The line for whether it's more beneficial to work or not work is somewhere in the $40k range pre-Covid insanity where who knows what the breakeven level is now. The minimum wage is intertwined with transfers and all the federal to the point that it's almost meaningless. Besides, it's probably not expected that people have WMT and MCD careers at least as far as low wage jobs. And in any case, those are extremely competitive industries. I mean how much are they supposed to pay cashiers, burger flippers, and shelf-stockers? I did some of those things (and labor stuff) when I was a teenager, and glad I did. FWIW, my wife teaches pre-school part-time and gets paid an hourly wage that doesn't even crack the $teens. Those government-funded park districts...oops...I mean corporations! Oh well, if she were in a union we'd be able to tax the population more for her bloated wage to the point that everyone flees the neighborhood once their kids are out of school -- the present situation. Digress! Covid-world razed the small business world while being an incredible boon to massive corporations. Who's to blame for that? There are plenty of quality hires out there, many of which are skilled labor workers that pay good wages. See Dirty Jobs, etc. But we insist on subsidizing college for so many students who have no business being there. Anyone who went to a non-elite school knows that. All of this is a byproduct of here we are right now. The gov't is just creating money that doesn't exist to pay people to stay off their lawns and vote for them. Simple as that. The cure is not to centralize power even further in the hands of these people. If we go socialist, we're going to get killed by other countries who are more capitalist and even cutting taxes. The "Gellin' Like Janet" Yellen global minimum tax is hilarious -- trying to reframe the argument around sentimental things domestically and convince other countries to do the U.S. a favor rather than become more competitive. Why on Earth would they do that? ** PC response to disagreement...... "The point you missed was that those companies typically don't employ career workers. I noted my experience to give myself some credibility for discussing the dynamics of those jobs rather than come across as a pompous, distant observer. You also accused me of "blaming socialism." That didn't happen either. I blamed cronyism, corruption, and partisan politics for where we're at, and said socialism will only amplify that.**