That would be Bobby, the chess master, and Bill, whose IQ is probably double W's

Or because it's consonant with your political objectives. And "Infrastructure" and "amenities" are subject to definition at your convenience.

Didn't the UK privatize the rail system? Is that not "public transport"? When I used it it seemed to work quite well, compared with the government-subsized Amtrak system..admitedly my UK experience is highly anecdotal.

I know who you meant. Fischer's a nutcase.

As for BillG, we know much more about his bank account than his IQ. He's certainly a skilled marketeer and monopolist.

Not exactly, in that the people who fall into the "particular class" change. Listen, if you begrudge the folks that get welfare, just become disabled, or lose all of your assets, become "involuntarily unemployed", and you can be one of them. It's just that simple.

The country is only as strong as its weakest link. Do you think we would be better or worse prepared for world domination with a poverty-stricken homeless class to deal with. Don't get me wrong - my solution is not a government dole. I think I stated before that wealth gluttons should accept a lower income so that jobs can be created which have incomes high enough to support a family. See, I'm all about "the family".:earth:

Bill Clinton - Rhodes Scholar - now tell me how stupid he is.

That's true even if the "particular class" is "alive".

If you want to assert that what the Constitution calls "the general welfare" is served by what you might refer to as "welfare payments", you'll have to offer more by way of evdence. Decades of welfare stateishness has not abolished poverty or homelessness, and in many ways actually encourages it.

I don't buy the argument that money should be taken from me for redistribution according to some do-gooder's criteria of worthiness or neediness. That's bullshit. Who the hell gave you the right to regulate somebody else's income because you think they're a "glutton"?

If you want to assert that what decades of welfare stateishness has encouraged poverty or homelessness, you'll have to offer more by way of evdence.

Who gave you the right to determine that these folks should be left on their own, to deal with their problems by themselves? Obviously, the majority elected a congress that disagrees with you. I think you might be out of step.

Yes we did and yes it is. England is not a socialist country. I have never claimed it to be such. We are not a socialist country, we are a capitalist democracy. As per our democratic will, our capitalist democracy has been fitted with some social safeguards as a direct response to the detrimental effects that deep seated poverty was having on our country.

The rail service was privatised by the previous conservative government, who had a great deal in common with mainstream republicans and despised all forms of 'socialism'. The current Labour government allowed that change to continue rather than dragging the whole system back into public hands. The current government is also (despite its roots in a socialist leaning party) not socialist.

In the years since the rail service was privatised, it has been beset with problems; the level of service has significantly reduced; the prices have been hiked far more than anybody expected; the government has had to throw tax-payers money at the project time and time again, so as to retain some sort of service in the face of mis-management. It is widely recognised on both sides of the House that this was a mistake. The left believe it should never have happened and the right believe it was done in entirely the wrong way.

What the answer is i don't know. I would like to see the rail service back in public hands. Right now, we have different companies responsible for each little facet of your journey....consequently there are many times when those don't link up properly. Things slip between different spheres of influence and responsibility (this had led to some fairly severe safety concerns over the years) and the system is unwieldy and unnecessarily complicated, particularly if you are travelling between regions and making changes along the way.

There are those on the right who argue that some sort of private-public joint governance might be a good idea, as long as the system gets linked up rather than remaining in its current fragmented state.

Right now, some people have a very good experience of train travel, but many have very bad experiences of it. It can vary not just region to region but change to change as well.

Not really, countries dont give important jobs to it's weakest groups. If you look at the world as one large conglomerate we can point to evolution as the greatest example of how, by allowing those who fail to adapt and thrive to fade away, the entire group is strengthened. Socialism goes against basic evolutionary principle, once we get schools up to speed so kids can actually understand it teaching evolution will be a great boost to humanity's progress. Thrive or die, that's nature.

I have the evidence of my own experience, but you made the first claim: that "welfare payments" enhance the "general welfare" as intended by the Constitution; the burden is on you.
The Constitution, again. Asking a silly parallel question isn't an answer. What principle entitles you to decide someone has "too much money" and thus should be subject to the redistribution of wealth?
Bread and circuses. It's not as bad as it could be, nor is it worse than it has ever been. But it certainly could be better. I'm not even sure it's all that "obvious" that the majority agrees with you; weren't you just whining about the President (and presumably his tax cuts)?

Given your narrative, it's difficult to beleive it was done in the right way. I can only compare my expereince travelling a few trips between Heathrow/Paddington/Swansea/King's Cross with what comparable travel on Amtrak would have entailed. Yet when I admired the service everyone rolled their eyes and complained about how awful it was.

I can well imagine that constant injections of government money were necessary if the operators wern't permitted to terminate unprofitable service. That's pretty much the Amtrak story too.

Now the president is part of congress? Check the constitution: they're in seperate branches of government.

Where?
None. I think people should decide for themselves that they have enough, and compensate their employees better, improve their benefits, or lower the price of their product or service. Instead, they tend to be wealth gluttons.

By the way, you can't feed the homeless in Orlando or Dallas, either. :bolt:

More money being brought in by a company usually does result in higher wages or better benefits for employees above a certain point on the company ladder. The lower you go, the less you see the effects.