Question for the right wingers

[Happy Monkey]

Check out "Protecting Family Members Who Lose a Loved One" on
Kerry's page.

[Lady Sidhe]

To mari:

Yeah, you'll definitely need ID, like birth certificates for all family members, any paycheck stubs (usually two month's worth, if you have them), any bill stubs, things like that.

Sidhe

[Yelof]

I have not been posting much, I have not returned to my Lurkum (hi thelorax!) I have started an
intensive Portuguese course, I've been having to clear my workload to be able to do this course and
to top it off our youngest has caught chickenpox!

I have not being following this thread but earlier the concepts of entitlement and self sufficency were
contrasted and I have been thinking a bit about the issues, here is my take.

Warning long post, perhaps a bit rambling!

I think those who emphasize the need for self sufficency and the idea that a welfare state breeds a sense
of entitlement that endangers to sense of self sufficency are missing a few points, one of those is inheritance.

If our lives consisted of equal quality education and after the age of 18 each child was on its own
unable to profit from their parents then you could better make the case that ones fate in life was determined
by ones actions and abilites.
Why should the children of the poor suffer the sins of their parents?
Why should the children of the rich and middle class get a head start in the rat race?
The rich and well off are often not in their privillaged position solely through the merits of their
own abilities and efforts but often through the gains of their ancestors either through direct
finincial aid or through the achievemnts of all our many ancestors who have gifted us the advanced cililization
we live in.
It would be nonsense to ban inheritance as I proposed above, parents would always find ways to help
their children, in the cold war communist countries inheritance supposedly didn't exist but nepotism was
rampent, children can expect an inheritance from their parents. We are all the children of our civilisation, that civilisation has an inheritance to give why should one group of people be more deserving of it then another?
Another way of looking at this concept of social inheritance would be for example the national health system of the UK, that was created in the aftermath of WWII as a desire to bring good from bad, it is the fruit from the sacrifice of that war, to remove it would be to squander their inheritance, many of the western worlds social security systems have been born of struggles.

So we should not forget that most owe their lot in life to the throw of the dice, why should the rich care
about this? Would not the natural goodness of the human soul allow for a safety net to be provided willingly by the well off to catch the worst excesses of unequal wealth? I think no, there have been many cililizations on this planet and as far as I know none have operated so.
The arrival of civilisation in a part of the world can be noted in the bones of the dead, in hunter gatherer societies there is little difference between the health of individuals that can be noted in their bones, the arrival of civilization brings a large population and also greater differnce in the health of its peoples, some better of, most worse off, and on average the diet and life span of the civilized person drops from the health and life span of a hunter gatherer. The history of civilazation has been one long series of exploitions by a ruling class of those who have no power or wealth. Until recently that is, democracy is unpresedented, power (the vote) has been given to all as a birth right.
How did this happen? I personnally can think of two causes: 1 industrialisation and the end of serfdom/slavery required an educated workforce, this educated workforce was not going to stand for the status quo and unionised 2: The enlightenment allowed shiften the subject of mans study to man, no longer could suffering be glorified in the name of God.
The wealthy elect were made to surrender total power to the masses in order to maintain the life of privillage, I don't think they would have done this left to themselves, so I advance the notion if we were to remove all social support from an advanced nation and instead rely on charity, it would not work and the wealth divide would increase. Why should the well off care? they have no choice, in a democracy the poor have a vote and will use this power to obtain wealth, take that vote from them and you will have massive social unrest and the weathy would lose their wealth all the same. Human nature left to itself sucks, at our core we are not nice people, it has taken the long march of civilization and learning to advance good behaviour to our nonbloodline neigbour, remove all hope from the bottom of society and take all obligation from the top and it would not take us long to revert again.

I choose Social Redistridution (socialism) because it is unnatural.

Sorry for taking all your time

Your post makes a lot of sense, Yelof. Obrigada. I imagine the US must seem a very strange country to other civilized western nations. The American people seem to have no difficulty with what amounts to welfare for the rich (corporate tax dodges, tax cuts for the wealthy, frank corporate nepotism on the level of the White House), yet scream bloody murder if a senior citizen is allowed a free meal once a week at the local soup kitchen. I very much doubt if a single conservative who posts to this board can define the term "enlightened self interest." They certainly can define the terms "selfish" and "lazy," however. They are too lazy and too complacent to attempt thought "outside the box," and I believe this will bring about the downfall of this country. If you refuse to see a problem, you certainly are not going to be able to solve it. Sometimes I just want to withdraw from public dialogue altogether, turn off the news, stock pile a ton of canned goods and go become a hermit in southern New Mexico and spend the rest of my days in peaceful oblivion to what is going on in this nation and the world. But I don't really want to be a hermit, and every time I set foot on the streets of any town or city in this nation, the things I see make me sick at heart. I would lead a happier life if I could adopt a hardened "they deserve it" attitude which seems to be the mindset of so many of my fellow Americans. I really wish I didn't feel as much as I do.

[elSicomoro]

Originally posted by marichiko
I very much doubt if a single conservative who posts to this board can define the term "enlightened self interest." They certainly can define the terms "selfish" and "lazy," however. They are too lazy and too complacent to attempt thought "outside the box," and I believe this will bring about the downfall of this country.

That's an awfully broad brush you're using, don'cha think?

Originally posted by sycamore


That's an awfully broad brush you're using, don'cha think?

Oh hell, its late and I've had two glasses of cheap wine. I'm lucky I can hold a brush at all.

[Undertoad]

Mari, perhaps they see different problems than you do.

[depmats]

Why is it just assumed that those who have wealth either inherited it or screwed others over to get it? Why is it so hard to believe that most people with a sizeable net worth just went out and made it happen? Certainly chance plays a huge role in the accumulation of wealth, but one must be in the right position to take advantage of chance happenings.
Those who accumulate large wealth were often flat broke in the past because they were willing to take large risks, and some didn't pan out. But they keep on plugging ahead until something does work.
It all boils down to choice. I'm not a statistic junky (83.6 of statistics are made up on the spot but I remember seeing an article that tracked former lottery winners - there was a very high percentage that were flat broke and filed BK in just a few years. They made exceedingly bad decisions with their money even though they are started out wealthy.
On the other hand I have several clients who have never made more than $40,000 in a single year and have well over $1 million saved for their retirement.
Life is full of choices, some work some don't. It doesn't make sense to blame others when your choices don't work. There is no rational reason to force others to give up their earned wealth (in the form of taxes) to support long-term welfare recipients.
Short-term rebound-type programs are a wonderful thing but they should be limited to short term.

Originally posted by Undertoad
Mari, perhaps they see different problems than you do.

You know, I'm sure that they do, and I think the large majority of people are good at heart. They're doing the best they can within the construct of their own lives and beliefs. I feel so strongly in part beause I used to be a member of that complacent middle class I speak of. Oh sure, I had a social conscience and contributed to worthy causes, but I really didn't understand about the lives of the people forced to exist on government subsidies. Then I fell through the looking glass and what a rude awakening it was!

Originally posted by depmats
Why is it just assumed that those who have wealth either inherited it or screwed others over to get it? Why is it so hard to believe that most people with a sizeable net worth just went out and made it happen? Certainly chance plays a huge role in the accumulation of wealth, but one must be in the right position to take advantage of chance happenings.

Exactly so. One must be in the position. How does that happen? People are in a position to get ahead when they've had an education, when they believe in themselves, when life hasn't knocked them around so badly that they've given up in despair. For example, take two children. One comes from a working class home with two parents. The child sees Mom and Dad struggle to make ends meet, but those two parents are there for their child. They make sure he does his homework, they instill him with a sense of self respect and give him a good value system. The kids he hangs out with all want to make something of their lives and believe they can do it. The second child comes from a single parent home and suffers abuse at the hands of his Mom's various boyfriends. Mom is too busy trying to survive to put much energy into her child. He cuts class and the school can't inform Mom about this because she didn't have the money to pay the phone bill and the telephone company discontinued her service. The kid hangs out with the druggies when he does go to school. Now which child is most likely to jump at an opportunity and make a go of it? Sure, its possible for the second kid to overcome those handicaps of upbringing, but they ARE handicaps and the ARE real.

Its true that in our country, there has arisen a sort of welfare lifestyle. Children are raised in homes where the father is absent. The males who do come into their lives may be abusive (and the women as well). They live in subsidized apartment buildings where everyone is in the same boat. The public schools in the area are underfunded and of lower quality than the ones in the suburbs across town. All the kids see modeled for them is dependency on the government, crime, drugs, and despair. The girls get pregnant at 16 and do what Mom modeled for them to do - go on welfare. The boys do what Dad modeled for them to do, impregnate the girls, get in trouble with the law and vanish off into jail somewhere. Its a vicious cycle.

I'm certainly in favor of welfare reform. Give those people on welfare the education and training to find work. Provide day care for the kids, so they're not unsupervised, out on the streets. Give people private housing vouchers so they're not "ghetto-ized" into these vast government subsidized building complexes. Offer them hope and the tangible skills to find a way out of that life style. Establish goals for the people who are on welfare. "In 3 months you must show us that you have enrolled in this training program or that school. You must provide us with progress reports at 3 months intervals there-after, showing that you are continuing to progress in your school. At the end of two or 4 years you will show us a certificate of completion, etc." Then give them the support to accomplish this. Encourage people to be self sufficient and beleive in themselves, but don't spit on them and kick them when they're down.

[wolf]

Originally posted by marichiko


Oh hell, its late and I've had two glasses of cheap wine. I'm lucky I can hold a brush at all.

That's pretty stupid.

You're claiming to be on disability subsequent to brain damage, and continue to use substances which even in small amounts contribute to brain damage.

Originally posted by wolf


That's pretty stupid.

You're claiming to be on disability subsequent to brain damage, and continue to use substances which even in small amounts contribute to brain damage.

See? The act of a brain damaged person!:p

[smoothmoniker]

Yelof, here's my problem with wealth redistribution as a basis for social construction.

As you so eloquently stated, human beings are inherently selfish. Call it a corrupt human nature, call it an evolved survival skill, whatever the case, we tend to do the thing that is in our best self-interest.

The beauty, the balance, the strength of capitalism is that it creates a self-interest toward benefiting society. If you make yourself useful to society in your capacity as a productive member, you are rewarded with money. The more useful you make yourself, either by quantity of work, or by rarity of your particular skill, the more you are rewarded. In a capitalist structure, you are free to make yourself useful to others, and you are rewarded in proportion to that usefulness.

When we remove the financial incentive to becoming useful to others, through taxation and wealth redistribution, the prime self-interest changes. In a community where usefulness is not rewarded, where gains made through productivity are confiscated and redistributed, then why expend energy in being useful? Why not expend that energy in amusement, entertainment, in selfish acts?

There is an underlying assumption to socialism that wealth is a static thing, that each culture has a certain amount of it, and that if some person has more of it, it must be at the expense of someone else. That’s simply not the case. If the economics and the politics of the United States bewilder and frustrate you, at least be objective enough to learn this lesson from us. Wealth is the cumulative effect of the productive members of society. The more productive each member is, the more productive the whole society is. And the more direct the compensation is for productivity, more self-interest each person in that society has toward making themselves useful. Our staggering national wealth comes from an economic system that maximizes the usefulness and productivity of the greatest number of people.

That is the strength of this culture. We allow the individual to be rewarded for their productivity, in direct proportion to their usefulness. The cumulative effect is a nearly unsinkable economy.

-sm

[wolf]

Marichko had asked where the numbers come from ... Here is one Source

It's called the "Green Book" and is a gov't report.

And, btw, illegals are eligible for emergency funding through medicaid.

The differences between benefits and distributions to resident and non-resident aliens is striking. California supports more than three million such persons ... Colorado around 71,000.

As far as the hispanic/latino origin info goes, you can check the 2000 census for the racial/ethnic demographics ... Colorado's population is 74.5% white (nonhispanic - the overall figure for persons identifying as "white" was 82.8%), Calif 46.7% white nonhispanic. Hispanic populations are respectively CO 17.1% and CA 32.4%

Originally posted by wolf
Marichko had asked where the numbers come from ... Here is one Source

It's called the "Green Book" and is a gov't report.

And, btw, illegals are eligible for emergency funding through medicaid.

The differences between benefits and distributions to resident and non-resident aliens is striking. California supports more than three million such persons ... Colorado around 71,000.

As far as the hispanic/latino origin info goes, you can check the 2000 census for the racial/ethnic demographics ... Colorado's population is 74.5% white (nonhispanic - the overall figure for persons identifying as "white" was 82.8%), Calif 46.7% white nonhispanic. Hispanic populations are respectively CO 17.1% and CA 32.4%

First of all, try reading my complete posts. I agreed that Colorado has a lower Hispanic population, and merely wondered why, this being so, Colorado felt the need to post statements about eligibility for social services programs in Spanish, while other adjacent states with far higher Hispanic populations felt no need to do so.

Actually, I have no quarrel with the thinking that the US should not provide public assistance to every illegal immigrant who happens to wander over the border. We may still be a comparitively wealthy country, but it is not our job to provide assistance to the entire population of Mexico and Central America. Those countries need to make reforms in their own educational and economic systems to address their own widespread poverty problems.

What I was curious about is the percentage of people who are found to be cheating the system. That's something I would truely like to know and I'd like to see the statistics from an impartial source with neither a conservative nor a liberal agenda to fulfill.

Yes, illegal aliens can get emergency medicaid care. That means if an illegal is involved in some terrible car wreck or has a heart attack, we won't leave them bleeding to death on the street. This is simple human decency, and I don't see why anyone would have a problem with it. On a more pragmatic level, it puts one off to have to step over dead bodies on the way to work in the morning. When I spent some time in northeastern Brazil, it was not out of the question to encounter somebody lying dead on the sidewalk. Such incidents would trouble me for long afterward, but maybe you have a stronger stomach than I.

Here is what the document you cited states on the issue:

Unlike earlier Federal law, the 1996 welfare reforms
expressly bar illegal aliens from most State- and locally-
funded benefits. The restrictions on these benefits parallel
the restrictions on Federal benefits. Illegal aliens are
generally barred from State and local government contracts,
licenses, grants, loans, and assistance. Exceptions are made
for:
1. Treatment for emergency conditions (other than those
related to an organ transplant);
2. Short-term, in-kind emergency disaster relief;
3. Immunization against immunizable diseases and testing for
and treatment of symptoms of communicable diseases; and
4. Services or assistance (such as soup kitchens, crisis
counseling and intervention, and short-term shelters)
designated by the Attorney General as: (i) delivering
in-kind services at the community level; (ii) providing
assistance without individual determinations of each
recipient's needs; and (iii) being necessary for the
protection of life and safety.