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Post Info TOPIC: What your college kids think about their future


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RE: What your college kids think about their future
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No progress in "fiscal cliff" talks as new poll hits Republicans

rint

A Wall Street Journal-NBC News poll released late on Wednesday, however, held the potential to shake up the stalemate. Three-quarters of those surveyed, including 61 percent of Republicans, said they would accept raising taxes on the wealthy to avoid the so-called cliff, as Democratic President Barack Obama is demanding.

With Republicans in Congress already divided, that rejection by their own supporters of the core demand of Republican House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner could further weaken his position.

Both sides refused to give any ground in public, one day after what Boehner described as a "frank" conversation with President Barack Obama about the remaining hurdles to a deal.

Boehner said Obama's latest proposal for $1.4 trillion in new tax revenues did not fulfill his promise for a balanced approach to taming the federal deficit and could not pass Congress.

"I remain the most optimistic person in this town, but we've got some serious differences," Boehner told reporters after a meeting with House Republicans where he warned members the negotiations could run through the holidays and up to the end-of-year deadline.

If a deal is not reached, taxes will go up for almost all working Americans at the start of the New Year and steep government spending cuts will kick in.

White House spokesman Jay Carney said Obama would not relent on his demand that Republicans drop their opposition to raising new revenue by increasing the tax rates for the wealthiest 2 percent of all Americans.

"There is no way to do this without rates going up on the top earners," Carney said. The Republican stance that sufficient revenue could be gained by closing tax loopholes and limiting deductions was "just not plausible economic policy," he said.

In what has now become a daily battle of sound bites and political stagecraft, a group of Republican congressmen posed in the cold outside the Capitol with a few dozen small children to illustrate their argument that Obama's budget proposals would bury the next generation in unsustainable debt.

"We are going to relegate these kids, our grandkids, to a lower standard of living," Republican Representative Sean Duffy of Wisconsin said. "We are going to leave them with higher tax rates. This is unacceptable."

Obama and Boehner each have proposed cutting deficits by more than $4 trillion in the next 10 years as part of a deal to avert the cliff, but they differ on how to get there. Economists have warned that failure to strike a deal could send the economy back into recession.

On Tuesday, Boehner rejected a White House proposal to shrink the amount of deficit reduction that comes from revenue to $1.4 trillion from $1.6 trillion over 10 years. Boehner has called for $800 billion in revenue through tax reform.

'A PRETTY FRANK CONVERSATION'

Boehner said Obama's plan did not do enough to reduce the federal deficit. "The president and I had a pretty frank conversation about just how far apart we are," he said of their Tuesday phone talk.

Carney ridiculed the Republican argument that sufficient revenue could be raised by closing tax loopholes or capping deductions. "Those magic beans are just beans, and that fairy dust is just dust," he said. "It is not serious."

Boehner has repeatedly offered gloomy assessments of the state of the talks in public, even as signs of progress have sprouted on Capitol Hill. The pace of staff-level talks has quickened in recent days as the two sides exchanged counter-offers that neither side said was sufficiently detailed.

The stubborn differences have dampened hopes of a potential deal before the Christmas holiday. "Keep your Christmas decorations up and make no plans" to leave Washington, was Boehner's advice in the closed-door meeting with Republicans, Representative John Shimkus of Illinois told reporters.

In exchange for more tax revenues, Republicans have demanded deep spending cuts in politically popular social entitlement programs like the government-funded Medicare and Medicaid healthcare plans.

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said that House Democrats objected to Republican efforts to raise the age when seniors become eligible for Medicare, which now stands at 65, as a way to cut government spending.

"Raising the retirement age does not get you that much money, so you're doing a bad thing when it comes to seniors, and you're not achieving your goal," she told CBS.

Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid said on Wednesday that Boehner and Republicans needed to make concessions on taxes. "To this point there hasn't been a lot of progress, and I'm very, very disappointed," he said on the Senate floor.

Financial markets have watched the negotiations with interest. JPMorgan Chase & Co CEO Jamie Dimon said the United States could have a "booming economy" in a couple of months if lawmakers in Washington reach agreement.

A budget deal could mean 4 percent economic growth and a drop in unemployment, Dimon said at a New York Times conference in New York. A deal would need to link any tax increases with spending cuts, he said.

"The table is set very well right now," Dimon said.

The stock market was closely following an announcement by the Federal Reserve of a new stimulus plan but the fiscal cliff was not far from investors' minds.

"This was expected, and the market is waiting for the year-end 'fiscal cliff' issue to be solved, so what we have to do is have confidence our political system can actually make a functional decision," said Troy Logan, managing director and senior economist at Warren Financial Service, in Exton, Pennsylvania.



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Hey, longprime:

besides what Obama, Reid, and Pelosi actually blew through, they've added another back-breaking entitlement just like all the other ones that are digging our graves. Spare me from the "wars on a credit card" line, please, because Iraq doesn't even compare to the structural damage democrats have done and continue to do.

Republicans are just embarrassing themselves and me when they try to bacon it on up. Petty little pikers.



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Sing it out Catahoula. Don't know if anyone remembers RNC home pages where they continually praised our then fearless leader, 2001-2008. 

Additional: 2010, ObamaCare debates where, the R's accused the D's in "pulling the plug on grandma". But we all know that 80% of medicare expenses are used in the last 6 months and by just 20%. The R's can not reform Medicare without this recognition.evileye



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Things have changed.

Yes. In more ways than most people realize. See "Coming Apart" by Charles Murray.

The middle class was created by the industrial revolution. Huge amounts of labor were needed to man the assembly lines, and middle managers to keep them all running.

We are in the midst of a new kind of business revolution; one that rests on cognitive ability rather than on labor. In the cognitive revolution those with the highest intelligence are in a seller's market. The movers and shakers, the growth segment, of industry is Google and Microsoft and Apple and the like. It's smarts that is most in demand these days, and is paid the most.

A new paradigm is developing right in front of us, and all around us, but we're still thinking and evaluating the situation by the standards of the old one.

The mentality of entitlements is exacerbating the problem. Its penchant for keeping people on the dole who are already on it, and encouraging ever more people to join the ranks makes things ever worse. And that's just the mechanics, the logistics, of those programs. The other effect of those programs is the cultural effect. It used to be that being on the dole was a stigma. Now it's the new normal. Now its expected. If anything even remotely considered "bad" happens to a person, why, the government has a program ready and wating to bail them out. Look at the Sandy aftermath and the right to work issue currently in Michigan. People have become so conditioned to being nannied through life through redistribution that when they run out of other people's money they become furious. They practically riot. In Greece they DO riot. The programs that were intended to reduce income inequality and make life better for everyone are precisely the ones that are making things worse.






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Conservatives have embraced the stop spending line, of late. I wouldn't say that has always been the case. Politicians, as a general rule, tend to like projects that favor their constituencies. No matter what their political party. Sometimes...often, there are projects that are costly. Some are even unnecessary. When money seems to keep being generated, it is easy to keep spending. Things have changed. Our country isn't a gigantic ATM anymore. Yet...many in DC and voters besides, don't acknowledge it.

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Financial markets have watched the negotiations with interest. JPMorgan Chase & Co CEO Jamie Dimon said the United States could have a "booming economy" in a couple of months if lawmakers in Washington reach agreement.

A budget deal could mean 4 percent economic growth and a drop in unemployment, Dimon said at a New York Times conference in New York. A deal would need to link any tax increases with spending cuts, he said.

"The table is set very well right now," Dimon said.

Total number of baseless suppositions aside, isn't Dimon exactly the kind of fat, rich, shirking SOB democrats have been basting for the last year or so?



-- Edited by catahoula on Wednesday 12th of December 2012 08:18:02 PM

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...we've been kicking the can down the road to serfdom...

Funny: when I heard our Ag secretary tell the rural/farming population they were becoming increasing irrelevant, "serf" is exactly what came to mind.



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Heh, "stop spending" and "pay down the debt" sound just like "turn off the oxygen and pull the plug" to... what did idad use to call them? Congress critters? The horror -- Tea Party faithful must have been monstrous little kids, the kind that leave a trail of tortured, mutilated little animal carcasses buried in shrub beds.

You're right to be suspicious, longprime.



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Congressman or congresswoman, bringing home the bacon is what it's all about, winchester. In their mind, "stop spending and pay down the debt" (SSAPDTD), is just an aggressive form of assisted suicide so I was being more literal than anything else.

Republicans blew through the mad money when they were in charge - that ass from Alaska, Don Young, comes to mind. The RNC can keep backing the type that's not that much different from democrats as to spending if they want but I think they're dooming us to minority party status. I mean, who's the 47% voter going to choose: the one that spends like a liberal, and really is, or the one that spends like a liberal and isn't?



-- Edited by catahoula on Wednesday 12th of December 2012 03:18:19 PM

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"stop spending" and "pay down the debt" sound just like "turn off the oxygen and pull the plug"

Cat you're probably just being facetious, but that kind of thinking is all too prevalent. Many people actually believe that sh**.

Of course payin down the debt sounds like pulling the plug...to anyone who believes in the standard liberal mythology of conservatives as heartless. In that case then just about any time a conservative even suggests, even hints, that resources are not infinite the natural, automatic conclusion of the liberal mind, of the liberal morality, is that the conservative is a selfish narcisist (yes, that's redundant) who would like nothing better than to throw granny off the cliff if it would somehow further line his pockets or feed his narcissism.

The logic that correlates conservative pleas to "stop spending" with "pull the plug" is not logical.



-- Edited by winchester on Wednesday 12th of December 2012 11:22:23 AM

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Well cat, the things the Tea Partiers have said are really horrendous.

Such obscenities like, "Pay down the debt!" And, "Stop spending!"

Terrible, just terrible.

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The following quote illlustrates the real problem. It's one of the issues I'm getting at with all my talk about culture. Our behavioral autopilot has us thinking in the exact wrong way:

The record is clear. Central planners failed, in the Soviet Union, in Cuba, at the U.S. Postal Service and in America's public schools, and now they stifle growth in Europe and America. Central planning stops innovation.

Yet for all that failure, whenever another crisis (real or imagined) hits, the natural instinct is to say, "Politicians must do something."
Government Gone Bad

One of America's founding principles is to mimimize government; to have that amount of government which is actually needed for its stated purposes and no more. The principle is to leave people alone to pursue happiness in their own way.

That idea went out with Woodrow Wilson and the progressives, and we've been kicking the can down the road to serfdom (i.e., "Politicians must do something") ever since. The biggest kicks came from Wilson, FDR, LBJ, and now our current progressive in chief.



-- Edited by winchester on Wednesday 12th of December 2012 06:44:53 AM

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Factions not fractions.

Homily not hominy.

Or, you're doing it intentionally in a Yogi Berra sort of way.





-- Edited by winchester on Wednesday 12th of December 2012 06:34:20 AM

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It's debatable whether a large percentage of the president's voting base expects to ever have to pay a dime on the tab he's running up, other than sales tax, personal care items like SS, etc.

Those Tea Party people are bad folks, lp... I think. I mean, it's hard to put your finger on exactly why they're scum but it's been said they're scum so many times they pretty much have to be. Extremists, radical, fringe,... not to mention racists. And that racist thing was proven beyond doubt back when they cat-called John Lewis and his entourage... though Lewis never claimed he heard a thing and nobody with him seemed to own a piece of electronics at the time, lol... proved without a doubt. And these extremists can't claim it's an image issue they didn't manage and got away from them, because the people that've called them scum for the last few years are reasonable people, ones without an agenda, so it simply has to be true. Even if they can't really articulate why in any comprehensible way.

Speaking of image management: I wonder how the unions in Michigan are going to explain away that video of their supporters beating down people that disagreed with them on a political point?



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Although there are many fractions in the TP, when I heard Republican, I saw TP. Not good. 



-- Edited by longprime on Tuesday 11th of December 2012 11:23:37 PM

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The electorate, in general, has no idea how precarious our country's finances-are.

Ask them about the Royal couple, or Honey Boo Boo or Tom Brady is up to, and you won't get blank stares. Ask them what a fiscal cliff is, and from the majority of folks, they won't be able to articulate what it s.

Not saying that they are dumb, but more blissfully unaware that this is a crisis.

Spending down on debt isn't as big a deal when we have a booming Economy. But we don't. Raising tax rates on only the wealthy still doesn't put us anywhere dealing with even a faction if the problem.

Spending less and taxing everyone more is a start. I am not a fan of paying more in taxes because our country is and always as been financially irresponsible with what money they have in their coffers. Same with my state government, at least.

I mean, a bullet train from LAX to Bakersfield that will take longer than Southwest from LAX to San Francisco doesn't really make sense.  Or that will take decades to construct and fund. But it's on the agenda of my state governor.  It's idiotic.  

Meanwhile, K-12 schools are facing this huge crisis that this new Prop 30 measure that passed is supposed to help fix. Only it won't.  Public colleges are losing revenue and not making it up with tax revenues, so they are raising their costs, nearly every year - sometimes twice, for the last several years.  Public pensions in California are f***ed up, too.  

 


-- Edited by SamuraiLandshark on Tuesday 11th of December 2012 06:54:21 AM



-- Edited by SamuraiLandshark on Tuesday 11th of December 2012 07:29:54 AM

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And, birthers aren't defined by their concern for the debt, while the Tea Party is.

True or false?



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you probably right about that, Cat. 

If the electorate really cared about the Debt, Interest rates would be much higher, stock markets would be lower and money would be flowing out of USA. 



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IMO, the Birthers is a construct of the fringe Right. Their premise is the legitimacy of PBO birth and if illegit, then all else that follows in this presidency iss illegit. The Birthers were probably shutdown or muffled by the centralized R's because they hurt their image-Trump, really made the Birthers look bad. disbelief

I'm betting that we will go over the Cliff. Followed by the capping of the Debt limit in 2013. Retail and light manufacturing shut down fairly quickly. Republicans collapse and TP are forced to form a third party, thus furtherng the demise of TP and the rise of the washlet bidet. wink



-- Edited by longprime on Monday 10th of December 2012 08:54:52 PM



-- Edited by longprime on Monday 10th of December 2012 08:56:09 PM

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Straight from the Daily Kos:

What Cheney meant was that the deficit didn't matter to the electorate, which voted in Republicans, despite having been told throughout the nineties that "balancing the budget" and reducing the National government's deficit was the holy grail. And, since Cheney's only interest was in having power, the deficit didn't matter to him for sure.

I'll have to assume that's also exactly what our president meant when he said the same thing about debt, but that neither he nor Cheney are Tea Partiers isn't really relevant, is it? Even if they both were, they'd each need to also be birthers biggrin to claim some sort of commonality between the two MSM closet monsters, wouldn't you?



-- Edited by catahoula on Monday 10th of December 2012 07:09:41 PM

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As Darth Cheny said, "Reagan and Bush1 proved that debt doesn't matter. " 

Kinda depends on where you are positioned when you are talking about debt. Holders of debt worried? I am not one to hold someone's debt, although I did loan a Rabid Republican, money, he and his wife are both on disability (47%), in arrears 3 years. $8k.  disbelief He is damned lucky to know me. bleh

What ever happen to Birthers? IMO the Birthers should have attacked the previous adminstration and the SC who were suppose to vet the President elect. 

You can blame TP on DS.no



-- Edited by longprime on Monday 10th of December 2012 05:08:03 PM



-- Edited by longprime on Monday 10th of December 2012 05:10:54 PM

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No, no, ignore them, lp, and let's get this mix-up of the birthers with the Tea Party straightened out.

I suppose a birther can believe more than one thing at a time so it's possible there are a few who've caught on to the fact we're borrowing almost exactly 1/2 of what we're spending these days. And it's plausible that one or two of those tortured by the fact every US man, woman, and child owes $53,400 towards the national debt (at the moment, that is) might occasionally wonder at the complicated origins of our current president.

But the things that make a birther a birther don't make him/her a Tea Partier, nor vice-versa.



-- Edited by catahoula on Monday 10th of December 2012 03:26:23 PM

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And why the obsesseion with eliminating TP from your life?  What evil did toilet paper ever do to you?



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Be sure that you are squating the next time I post for the answer.biggrin



-- Edited by longprime on Sunday 9th of December 2012 07:00:00 PM

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And which Tea Party ideas are repulsive?


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What do the birthers have to do with the objectives of the Tea Party, longprime?



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DW discovers a microfiber towel is about the cost of Costco's highest quality 2 rolls of TP. 

You just don't dry your upper face on the same towel evileye



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Did I mention that we have pretty much elminated TP in our lives by using a washlet bidet?

Yeah, I've heard that once or twice.

So, I'm guessing TP is only for drying. Sort of a disposable towel?


No disrespect taken from your snideness.

Hmmmm....."Your Snideness." Could be a cool screen name.









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Who are you and what have you done to longprime?

You're not fooling anyone. Longprimes posts are never more than a couple of sentences.

I mean it. Let longprime go or there'll be trouble.



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Reply Quote 
More indicator.png


There was an op ed piece yesterday where the op said that Bush W's tax cut was not to stimulate recession of 2000 (dot com-tech) but to cut the projected tax receipt from then pretty good economy and then higher tax rates. This was true. Again true in the tax cut of 2001. OP is correct, but we somehow have conveniently forgotten or ignored the original premise of the Republican tax cuts.

Ever since PBO was elected, the R's has been concerned about the debt, concerned about the cost and philosophy of W's bank bailouts, but ignored the affects of stabilizing the Capitalist System. The R's issue has been pushing the Debt issue progresssively harder ever since and brought It to the front over all other issues in 2012. Rightly so. However, the R's have successfully boxed themselves, sealed the lid, and allowed the floor to set.  USA will not solve the Debt by entitlements alone, because future jobs will be relatively low wage, because W's tax cuts benefited the richer among us - those who really pay the tax, and the aging of us Boomer.  So even if you cut the growth of entitlements, you still haven't solved the revenue problem. So, every time the R's balk on raising taxes, they make themselves look even more idiotic and future delay's only will make our economy worse and national debt deeper. . The R's are going suffocate unless they say, "Uncle Sam" is black and Native born.

IMO, PBO is getting payback. Notice that he never mention Debt in his 2012 campaign vs MR hammered the Debt issue. He is a lawyer afterall, and he knows how speak, and use the ignorance of the R's to let them make their box even more secure. 

IMPO, PBO is out to destroy the TPs. When the TP's got mainstream R to question his birth, the TP's questioned his Citizenship and thus directly impuned his Mom.  Both attacks would make anybody fight, and I hope he wins if for the sake of the Republican party. 

Notes: I am really upset with some of the radical elements of the Party. some ideas of the TP's are good but some are repulsive. I do not mean to dis the TP, Republicans, Democrats, Independents, Mom, Dad, USA, or anyone else. 

evileye

 



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That hole's been occupied for a long time, longprime. Not being a lawyer, I couldn't say for sure, but squatter's rights might even apply here.

Snide adds a little spice to what's usually been a dull day, so snide away, but the things we're snide to typically signal a dislike of and I was just curious as to the roots of yours for the Tea Party.



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From the TeaParty/Republicans who want their god given and Constitutional Rights unabridged. evileye

Suggestive and ominous but it doesn't really express exactly what you feel the average Tea Party supporter believes, longprime. That they're likely a scourge on the politcal body, yes, but not precisely why.

Would you elaborate?



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"More like 100 years but ok.

Agreed, if you're dating from a bad idea from intelligent people vs. the widespread adoption of it by rebels without a clue.


Also true. This is known as “pragmatism.”

Pragmatic in that the result is a service industry that votes just the same as it's clients.

Afraid I'm a pessimist but I think the only way you'll change the mindset of either of these blocks is with a stick, ideally one with fire on the end of it.



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"And you already know where that comes from." 

From the TeaParty/Republicans who want their god given and Constitutional Rights unabridged. evileye



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cat,

Winchester, dug a hole in his question " And you already know where that comes from." 

I decide to fill the hole with a snide remark ( no disrepect, Winchester). I could have said, "Democrats" and giving everyone a level field. 

And I'll be thinking about answering your question about TP's. Did I mention that we have pretty much elminated TP in our lives by using a washlet bidet?

Made another 4 Apple pies and 2 crisps on Monday. Two pies went to the lady that took my W away. evileye 

to the airport. 



-- Edited by longprime on Wednesday 5th of December 2012 09:57:40 PM



-- Edited by longprime on Wednesday 5th of December 2012 10:04:19 PM

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IMO social mores are declining and the tolerance of bad social behavior is rising. Something that I attribute to TV's soaps, two men and a half, Paris Hilton, tight pants and shirts, milk hormones, pushup bras, and finally poor economic status.

I agree, sort of.

I mean, it's true that all those things are happening, but I think you have cause and effect reversed. The things we see in soaps, two and a half men, etc are the effect of declining social mores and tolerance of bad behavior, not the cause.

The cause is more closely aligned with the morality of non-judgmentalism that seems to dominate our current culture.

And you already know where that comes from.




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You're correct. I mixed the metaphors. I was thinking too much about the fiscal cliffs and our amoral Congress.

IMO social mores are declining and the tolerance of bad social behavior is rising. Something that I attribute to   TV's soaps, two men and a half, Paris Hilton, tight pants and shirts, milk hormones, pushup bras, and finally poor economic status. 



-- Edited by longprime on Wednesday 5th of December 2012 09:16:24 AM

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It seems you are mixing metaphors.

What I call the bar is the current culturally accepted norms of social behavior. That's what this discussion is about, stemming originally from the abortion issue.

Your description of the bar in relation to the middle and wealthier classes refers to economics. That's a different subject. You are wandering off topic; mixing things up; confusing things.

Here's part of what I'm getting at:

The culture - social and moral capital - is the water all of us fish swim in. The water is becoming ever more fouled and the fish are becoming ever more sick. The Republicans want to treat the water, and the Democrats want to treat the fish.

All the rest is just rhetoric in support of those two basic positions.












-- Edited by winchester on Wednesday 5th of December 2012 07:20:33 AM

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"More like 100 years but ok. The point is the bar for what is generally considered trashy has been steadily lowered. Values have been lowered. "

Or perhaps you mean that we are broadening the middle by lowering what we call the lower bar? evileye



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"More like 100 years but ok. The point is the bar for what is generally considered trashy has been steadily lowered. Values have been lowered. "

I have an hominy, " There is a level in which we call fall [as I gently slam my open palm on the table], but there isn't a top where we can rise to, [with my other hand I indicate a level above our heads]. So tell me, where do you want to be in 5-10 years?" evileye

JIMO, we have increased our middle class in the last 100 years, and unfortunately our middle class has been shrinking not by rising ourselves into the wealther classes but by falling back into poverty and the lower wealth classes. evileye



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It has nothing do to with you, busdriver. It's not about you. It's not about things external to us. We use reason to justify what we want or don't want

One way or another, it was outside of her comfort zone. Maybe she really honestly thought it was a stomach virus and all the attention, and possible cost, and hours of sitting in waiting and/or exam rooms was not worth the trouble. Or maybe she's not comfortable accepting rides from people she's not used to riding with.

Her "reason" defended her gut feelings, and was more or less impervious to your reason.

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"I'm going to leave most of it to, well, to the nation really, for a park where no lumbermen'll cut down all the trees for houses with leaky roofs. Nobody'll kill all the beaver for hats for dudes nor murder the buffalo for robes. "

So you think that John Wayne said this because of the script (McClintok, 1963, as GW McClintok) or because he really meant it? So does this make JW a bleeding Democrat  or a Rhino? 



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I'd never considered that possibility, that I rated so low on the "automatic instantaneous internal like-o-meter" scale that the elderly lady preferred to die rather than accept a ride with me.

I didn't think my driving was that horrendous.

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Culture provides sort of a behavioral autopilot that most people follow. It consists of the rules and norms, some written, some unwritten, about which behaviors are acceptable and which are not.

Yes, and it's the 'most' that count. Yup, there are plenty of individual minds you can't change, whether it's because they're having a bad day or they're just at the age where a little deviation to the routine is threatening, but society benefits when the majority recognizes some behavior is trashy. (Trashy is a redneck slang kind of word but one so rich with connation it really serves better in conversation than 'outside the norm', etc. - at least, where I grew up.biggrin)

Somebody, somewhere along the line of the last 50 years or so, decided they'd enough social science (and social workers) to declare: "we'll throw all this mean and judgemental stuff out and just treat the pathologies as they appear.

And here we are. with a million or so abortions a year, and no real improvement in the underclass except guaranteed assistance.

 



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Part 2 of the message about changing hearts and minds is the “good news” half of the story.

Part 1, the bad news, is summarized below in my previous note. It is next to impossible to change hearts and minds in real time through direct argumentation and persuasion.

The good news is that given enough time it is possible with indirect methods. Indirect methods are harder. They take much longer. But they have a better track record of results.

The greatest example of an indirect method is the culture. Culture provides sort of a behavioral autopilot that most people follow. It consists of the rules and norms, some written, some unwritten, about which behaviors are acceptable and which are not. This is the default setting of hearts and minds.

The way to change hearts and minds, then, is to use indirect methods. It is to change the default settings of the behavioral autopilot of the culture and/or of the person. If you want to change hearts and minds then that is where you must focus your attention.

In THAT endeavor, reason, argumentation, persuasion IS important and it DOES matter.

But it has to be approached differently; indirectly.

It has to be approached with an attitude more like that of planting tiny seeds of ideas and then nurturing them, helping them to grow, over the long haul, than with an attitude of trying to convince someone that they are wrong and you are right.

You can't change a mind, but it is possible to change the path that a mind, or a culture, might follow.

Here are some recent books about the dual nature (i.e., instantly instinctual vs slowly rational) of the mind:

Thinking, Fast and Slow, by Daniel Kahneman
The Invisible Gorilla: How our Intuitions Deceive Us, Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons
Incognito: The Secret Lives of the Brain, by David Eagleman
Who’s In Charge, by Michael S. Gazzaniga
How We Decide, by Johan Lehrer
The Blank Slate, by Steven Pinker


Here are some about changing the path rather than changing hearts and minds:

Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth, and Happiness, by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein
Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard, by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
Made To Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, again by the Heaths







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society benefits when the majority recognizes some behavior is trashy

Yes. That’s true. This is what is known as having values.

Somebody, somewhere along the line of the last 50 years or so, decided they'd enough social science (and social workers) to declare: "we'll throw all this mean and judgemental stuff out.

More like 100 years but ok. The point is the bar for what is generally considered trashy has been steadily lowered. Values have been lowered.

(By the way, isn't it ironic how judgmental we are about being judgmental?)

In the name of “care” and “helping” and avoiding being judgmental – because, after all, being judgmental is mean, and we don’t want to be mean, do we? - we created a culture, a behavioral autopilot, in which dads are replaced with a government dole, and the more dad-free kids the more the dole.

We put a price tag on family and life, and a cheap one at that, and in so doing we also relieve people of some of the responsibility to look after either of them.
And then we’re SHOCKED that the family is disintegrating and life itself is a “choice.”

just treat the pathologies as they appear

Also true. This is known as “pragmatism.” It is also known as being “non ideological,” and “non judgmental.” It is also known as sticking our collective head in the sand.

Culture is the water we all swim in. And in the name of “tolerance” – being non judgmental – we lower the bar of what is considered trashy; we undermine and erode society’s values; we foul the water even more.

How many more hundreds of years is it going to take before we wake up to the fact that the "remedy" is what's fouling the water and causing most of the disease in the first place?


-- Edited by winchester on Tuesday 4th of December 2012 08:48:15 PM

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MOm is 96, and only recently stopped trying to resist me in aiding her to go to the toilet. She still fights us when we bathe her. 

What our kid is thinking about the future-How much snow will be in the mountains... among things that can't happen until 2013 April +, when he can put 2 years at current job on his resume.



-- Edited by longprime on Tuesday 4th of December 2012 07:31:46 PM

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 I don't know about that. Sometimes I feel powerless to change anybodies mind, even about completely obvious things.

It's that time of year again, where I can hopefully change someBody's hiney and other down there regions: Treat them to the water bath with a Washlet Bidet. About $400 to $800, depending on popular features. Where the Southern parts go, the mind will follow. 



-- Edited by longprime on Monday 3rd of December 2012 08:06:49 PM

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I don't know about that. Sometimes I feel powerless to change anybodies mind, even about completely obvious things.

This is very true. It’s at the core of many things I’ve said here. It applies to mundane every-day decisions, AND to much more weighty issues like politics.

We humans like to think we’re rational. We like to think we make decisions based on logical analysis of objective facts.

But the truth is we’re not like that; not at all.

All of us animals, humans included, have an automatic instantaneous, instinctive, intuitive, reaction – a feeling – to like or dislike, approach or avoid, fight or flee, the things we perceive around us. Our decision making process relies much more heavily on that instinctive feeling, just like all the other animals on the planet, than we like to think it does. Basically, the notion that we make decisions through logical analysis is little more than a self flattering illusion.

NOTE: Emphasis on instantaneous and automatic.

Conscious reason, on the other hand, is much, much slower. Reason comes into play long after our instinct has already decided whether we like or dislike something, AND it requires much more time to complete. Conscious reason requires language, words, sentences. It is physically impossible for reason to happen faster than our instinctual feeling to like or dislike something.

The real purpose of conscious reason, therefore, is to support and defend our subconscious instinct. Reason evolved to help us win. It evolved to help us persuade other people to behave in ways we want them to behave. Reason did not evolve to help us find the truth, or the “best” way to solve a problem or deal with an issue.

So when you offer to give someone a ride and their automatic instantaneous internal “like-o-meter” is not completely comfortable it is much more likely that they will use reason to find or make up excuses or rationales to avoid accepting your offer than it is that they will accept it.



-- Edited by winchester on Monday 3rd of December 2012 01:54:16 PM

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"You can change hearts and minds, for sure."

I don't know about that. Sometimes I feel powerless to change anybodies mind, even about completely obvious things.

For example, a couple of weeks ago, I offered to drive the elderly lady who watches our dogs to the emergency room, the doctor, bring her food, anything. She said she had a stomach virus, but she refused and said she wished everyone would leave her alone. I tried pretty hard, but was unsuccessful. But a week later she ended up in the hospital (because someone called 911), and now she's probably going to die, that is if she isn't dead already. I feel terrible that I couldn't talk someone into doing something that was so important, and couldn't figure out a way to influence her. If I can't do something as simple as that, how do you possibly change people's hearts and minds?

I just despair that it's even possible to change anyone's mind about anything. It is hopeless.

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