Was Obama a dogshit POTUS?

This much I can tell you, if you were an African American when he became president, you felt lifted up in the social hiarchy of your community. No longer could you say that your ethnicity could hold you back in life. Obama was a shining example how black Americans can be leaders, whether you thought he was a good one or not.

On the other hand, the majority of Americans did not come from the same background as Obama and he had a difficult time conveying unity. I thought he accentuated differences in race relations and caused more divisiveness in our country than any previous president, until now.

Trump has continued Obama’s rhetoric of political divide. The only difference is that Trump is criticized to the Nth degree more than any other president in history, probably because of his demeanor.

Obama was a mediocre president who rose to power in the most amazing and lucky way, and his presidency was marked with luck. Can you say Hurricane Sandy, as opposed to Hurrican Katrina (Bush)? How about having 8 years of peace, compared to 9-11, Afghanistan, and Iraq? Can you say quantitative easing and loose policy? I liked GW Bush and his stand for family, patriotism, and tax cuts for the middle class.

He was bad. Snowden is a hero

@Meatless: " Can you say quantitative easing and loose policy?"
___
QE was Fed policy and Bernanke was appointed under Bush. What does QE have to do with Obama's policy? We lost 10 million jobs because Wall Street sold shit mortgage-backed securities and derivatives during the Bush years. If anything the Obama's fiscal policy was too weak. Obama took office with the country bleeding jobs and Big-three auto companies needing a bailout. It's a miracle we came through it all the way we did. If Obama was to blame for anything, it was in trying to accomplish too many things at once instead of just focusing on getting us out of a financial meltdown.

...oh, and he was born in Kenya.

^ Yeah, how was he even able to get on the ballot. Still baffles me.

He was very effective at carrying out his agenda. It just sucks that his agenda was so bad for the United States. Probably the most harmful President in history.

You would have to go back to JFK and LBJ to find Presidents as good as Barack Obama. He got himself a very difficult job, and he handled it very well.

SJG

Mexico City
http://doxyspotting.com/?p=70423

If JFK hadn't been assassinated he would not be well regarded.

Damn, why did I read a SJG post.

Randumbmember, you must be dumber than you type because the QE followed what I considered “luck”, not his policies. Are you trying to look smart by trying to downplay somebody else’s comments, because you tried to jump all over that one without comprehending what you were reading. Keep trying to cheer up your liberal left wing playboys, because it only confirms how the left continues to look stupid in the nation’s eyes, which will keep us from voting for a democrat president for another decade if this trend continues bybyou and your left wing commies.

As I've said before, @Meatless, you writing style is so poor that nobody can follow what you're saying. It's common conservative dogma that "loose policy" is to blame for everything and, if fact, the EU's response to the crisis was austerity. So if you go back and read your incomprehensible horseshit, it sounds like your blaming Obama.

Do you really think I care about being on your ignore list, dipshit? Every time I look at your dumbfuck tagline, I think you should be looking at yourself in the mirror.

your*

Ran-Dumb - We already talked about this. The recession was not caused by the financial crisis. That had already been dealt with and yes, it was the Republicans that implemented the solutions. The recession was caused by blatant fear of what Obama was bringing to our country . Higher medical costs, increased labor costs and increased regulations.

But back to the OP. Obama should be regarded as the worst President that our country has ever had. And that includes FDR that kept us in recession for 3 terms.

^^^^^^ You must read Right Wing Nonsense News.

SJG

^^^ You must jump off your bed cock first into RandomMembers taint screaming “I love 15 year old boys”!

@Warrior: "Ran-Dumb - We already talked about this. The recession was not caused by the financial crisis. "
_____________
So we lost 3Million jobs in three months IMMEDIATELY after the fall of Lehman, and another 6 million jobs after that. But it had nothing to do with Wall Street and 4 trillion in bad loans. What a laughable load of horseshit.

Go back and look at when the recession started. It was late 2008. The financial crisis was 2007 and early 2008. Tarp was already in place by mid-2008 and the crisis was taken care of. It was when it was obvious that Obama was coming, that is when we started shedding jobs.

And the bad loans were all absorbed by the stockholders of those financial institutions holding them. Again, the government MADE money on the original TARP.

@Warrior, the fall of Lehman through the country into intense panic. That's when the country started bleeding jobs. Read Alan Blinder's book called "When the Music Stopped." What you're saying is ridiculous.

Final comment: Obama might have been too young and inexperienced to be president, and he only had two years in the Senate before being elected. I remember that, although the Dems had all branches of government, Obama had this idealistic vision that he would reach across for bi-partisan support. But from the instant he was sworn in, McConnell and the GOP wanted nothing more than to get rid of him.

"threw the country*

You have your timing all wrong. The economy was still growing when Lehman went down. Try to stick with the truth, OK ?

Warrior, our economy is built on "consumer confidence". This means that it takes very little to create a panic.

And beyond that, the booms are built on over production and over consumption. Cannot be sustained.

SJG

Being an owner of a small business all of our presidents and most of our congresspersons and senators, are crap, we manage to bake a living in spite of them, in all honesty, very few of these people could do what most small business owners do, which is why I have always said, nothing that they do in Washington DC has any relevance in my world.
Most of our government acts against our interest and favors the big guys, but we actually do pretty well by keeping our head down, and just going about doing what we do as well as we can.

IMO he accomplished nothing of positive significance. He had Democrat majority in both houses years 1-2, Democrat House and Republican Senate years 3-4, and Republican majority both houses years 5-8. Not an easy task to get significant items on his agenda done years 3-8 with Republicans controlling one or both houses.

Though I didn't favor most of his policies, as far as I could tell he had good ethics and gave thoughtful consideration to opposing views, which is more than can be said for the Oval Office's current occupant IMO.

Affordable Care Act was a major accomplishment. It was hard. Clinton tried it and failed. It always comes down to fighting Senator by Senator.

SJG

Affordable Care Act is complete shit, cannot be financially sustained, skyrocketing premiums for those who don't qualify, and coverages cancelled despite promises to contrary. The whole system should have been blown up.

It was a political compromise. We need now to go the rest of the way, Single Payer Universal Health Care.

SJG

As far as I’m concerned the ACA was just about the biggest giveaway of taxpayers money to the insurance companies in the history of our country, the Act was completely authored by lobbyists working for Humana and Blue Cross and is a pure and unadulterated scheme to enrich the insurance industry at the expense of the medical and ratepayer communities.

Need to move to Single Payer Universal Healthcare. ACA was a compromise to get it through the Senate.

SJG

No problem with single payor as long as I can do late term abortions..... like anytime up to 90 years old if you are no longer able to take care of yourself. If you NEED welfare, food stamps, UBI, etc.... abort them

and Obama was a piece of shit.... I would not piss on him if he was on fire

I wouldn't say he was dogshit, but he was a high minded idealist who had no use for blue collar people. He wanted to be a post-ideological technocrat, which doesn't work, because being post-ideological is itself an ideology. He also had the desire to make things more complicated than necessary, such as ACA and Dodd-Frank. He was also pro free trade, which means jobs get sent overseas and also the one thing Trump is right about.

@Daddillac
Would you piss on him if he were not on fire?

Obama was one of the worst. His attitudes were very divisive. His policies limited progress and increased the burden on middle class citizens.

Obama created shit policies - and fucked the country with his useless agenda. He was the most useless president since Jimmy Carter.

His love for Islam was impossible to hide - and his beast of a wife (who must pack a good 9” meat stick) had such anti-American hate it was impossible to hide!

As a rule you can't fully judge a president for 20 years after he leaves office to see just how his actions and policies impacted both our country and the world.

However I wasn't an Obama fan and in my opinion he was never truly vetted by the media. He got a pass on so many items during his run for office as well as his time in office and from what I observed first hand it was really odd how some things about him were wiped clean off the Internet and no one ever questions it.

The stimulus package never hit it's target--it really was a pork package

The GM buy out as we are seeing more and more was not a smart decision.

Acorn was swept under the rug....as was his affiliation with the then Gov. of Illinois who I think is still in prison.

Lois Lerner was allowed to retire after being an IRS thug.

He surrounded himself with really poor choices --Holder was an ass. Kerry had his head up his most of the time.

And as Cashman stated even as I was typing this out only Carter comes to mind as a worse president during my life time.....but then I classify Carter as the worst President in the last century.

Carter was a more ineffective and impotent president, but he didn't do the damage Obama did.

I heard something like this said about racism...

Peacefully electing a black man is a sign that the country is doing better in regards to racism.
Firing one is a much better indication the country is further along.

This is because it shows that the black person is held to the same accountability standard as anyone else.

Electing Obama, even though so little was known about him, made so many people feel better about themselves.

Even though he was a disaster, too many people were afraid to be called or feel racist if they were to vote against him.

You can still see it in the Dem party with their identity politics. So much is still weighted towards meaningless factors.

Black-check
Woman-check
Non-christian-check

We still have a long ways to go.

@flag.... no I would not piss on him if he were not on fire. His policies were awful and the divisiveness he created in this country is monumental. The Dems, like my cousin, will blame Trump for the divisiveness but they are completely fucking stupid to do so.... How in the world did we elect Trump if the country was not divided. The Conservatives bitched with their vote and made sure we did not have Obama 2.0.... so far the Dem response is to whine cry and bitch about how divided the country is, fuck them, they started this shit. Actions have consequences

Meat,

A serious question for you. You mention obama as being black. Does "black" override his "white"? Or perhaps, black privilege, you think?

Lol! Good question Clubber.

I didn’t vote for him and didn’t like him when he was in office. He screwed up a bunch of things. That said, I’ve come around on his vision of healthcare for all. Maybe it’s because I’m older and use my healthcare more. Maybe it’s because I’ve become convinced that healthcare has never been good in this country for anyone who is older than 25 and actually needs healthcare to work. He also had to deal with the recession and I give him credit for that even though I don’t agree with every step he took. While I disagreed with him, I don’t think he was corrupt. (I know others disagree.)

I think Trump is unethical, unintelligent and uninformed.

I’m hoping we return to some form of better leadership and most importantly bipartisanship, but after Obama and Trump, that is going to be difficult to heal those fractures.

@Cashman: "His love for Islam was impossible to hide "
___________
Religious conspiracy theory, and probably the most idiotic post in this thread. You and @SkiBirther have something in common.



@Warrenboy: "The stimulus package never hit it's target--it really was a pork package "
__________
Do you have anything to back that up? The best academic economists think the stimulus reduced the unemployment rate by about 2%, which is better than nothing.


@Warrenboy: "He surrounded himself with really poor choices"
_____
His initial economic team, Summers, Geitner, Orzag, and Romer were very talented. Summers is one of the smartest guys on the planet. However, there was a lot infighting and the team didn't last very long.





Agree with @Jimmy's post about healthcare and Obama will probably go down in history for bringing health insurance to 10s of millions who formally had no insurance. I've raised this point countless times, but all of you were vulnerable to becoming uninsurable-- and going bankrupt -- under the old system if you had the misfortune of getting sick. If you're old enough for Medicare, then Obamacare protects your children. Under the old system 50M Americans could not buy health insurance at any cost, and another 50M had to pay substantially more if they had a pre-existing condition. There's something in this plan for everyone and keeping sick and healthy people in the insurance pool benefits everyone.

The Obamacare "mandate" was eliminated under the Trump administration and that reduces the number of healthy people in the insurance pool. That's why prices went up, for some. The rest of Obamacare is the courts now, with an idiot GOP lawsuit that will probably fail.

Hopefully the Dem's will *not* go for single-payer and will adopt an incremental approach to getting everyone covered without kicking 150M people off their employer-sponsored plans. Single-payer would be a big mistake; it would probably cost the Dems the election in 2020.

No confirmation bias here! Just move along....

Obama was a corporate shill just like any other president. In many ways he was more pro corporate than Romney would have been.

Daddilac wrote, "No problem with single payor as long as I can do late term abortions..... like anytime up to 90 years old if you are no longer able to take care of yourself. If you NEED welfare, food stamps, UBI, etc.... abort them"

He always proves my thesis, if the poor want to be respected, then they need to organize and start piling up some corpses.

SJG

The poor in this country are respected far better than in any other country.... I have seen beggars tapping coins on my limo windows at the airport in Manilla, Caracas, Moscow, etc.... I have never seen that in America. I believe in giving a hand up.... I do not believe in giving a hand out. So if the leeches of this country want to continue bitching then we will see what happens.

Here you go SJG....

How Taxes Work . . .

This is a VERY simple way to understand the tax laws. Read on — it does make you think!!

Let’s put tax cuts in terms everyone can understand. Suppose that every day, ten men go out for dinner. The bill for all ten comes to $100. If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go something like this:

The first four men — the poorest — would pay nothing; the fifth would pay $1, the sixth would pay $3, the seventh $7, the eighth $12, the ninth $18, and the tenth man — the richest — would pay $59.

That’s what they decided to do. The ten men ate dinner in the restaurant every day and seemed quite happy with the arrangement — until one day, the owner threw them a curve (in tax language a tax cut).

“Since you are all such good customers,” he said, “I’m going to reduce the cost of your daily meal by $20.” So now dinner for the ten only cost $80.00.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes. So the first four men were unaffected. They would still eat for free. But what about the other six — the paying customers? How could they divvy up the $20 windfall so that everyone would get his “fair share?”

The six men realized that $20 divided by six is $3.33. But if they subtracted that from everybody’s share, then the fifth man and the sixth man would end up being PAID to eat their meal. So the restaurant owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each man’s bill by roughly the same amount, and he proceeded to work out the amounts each should pay.

And so the fifth man paid nothing, the sixth pitched in $2, the seventh paid $5, the eighth paid $9, the ninth paid $12, leaving the tenth man with a bill of $52 instead of his earlier $59. Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four continued to eat for free.

But once outside the restaurant, the men began to compare their savings. “I only got a dollar out of the $20,” declared the sixth man who pointed to the tenth. “But he got $7!”

“Yeah, that’s right,” exclaimed the fifth man, “I only saved a dollar, too … It’s unfair that he got seven times more than me!”.

“That’s true!” shouted the seventh man, “why should he get $7 back when I got only $2? The wealthy get all the breaks!”

“Wait a minute,” yelled the first four men in unison, “We didn’t get anything at all. The system exploits the poor!”

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up. The next night he didn’t show up for dinner, so the nine sat down and ate without him. But when it came time to pay the bill, they discovered, a little late what was very important. They were FIFTY-TWO DOLLARS short of paying the bill! Imagine that!

And that, boys and girls, journalists and college instructors, is how the tax system works. The people who pay the highest taxes get the most benefit from a tax reduction. Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may not show up at the table anymore.

Where would that leave the rest? Unfortunately, most taxing authorities anywhere cannot seem to grasp this rather straightforward logic!

So according to you only the top 10 percent received anything in the tax bill?.... really, if thats what you are learning in school go tell your teachers they are fired... in fact tell them I said "Those that can, do... Those that can't, teach"

I will certainly come out ahead with the new tax changes. I own my house, so I was already taking the standard deduction. The changes were pitched as being beneficial to renters, who have no mortgage and are less likely to itemize. But it works out well for thrifty people who avoid debt to begin with.

Lurker you must be one of the top 10% DC is talking about..... pony up some more money or either SJG is coming with his band of brothers lol

Tax money does not just vanish. They feds don't throw it into a furnace. They spend the money.

This is what keeps our economy going.

Unless the poor always want to be seen as asking for hand ups or hand outs, then they have to show that they have the same level of legality than any self determining people does. And this means piling up corpses.

SJG

The fact is what is written is very accurate and does not need simplifying.... it is just hard to stomach for those 4 who are not paying anything.

@SJG.... spending money on a lot of the social programs and saving the spotted owl is to a lot of people throwing it in the furnace, what one group sees as spending the other sees as wasting. Until you can uncross your optical and rectal nerve to get rid of your shitty outlook I'm afraid we are doomed to listen to your nonsense about what drives our economy

DC.... NO you did not, you adjusted it to numbers that make you feel better, there is nothing real about your numbers. Did you ask lurker if he was part of the top 10%?

Get out of your fairy tale

so the top .01% and the .1%..... but in " There's nothing wrong with the metaphor so to speak, I just adjusted it to the real world's numbers." you used the tenth guy, which actually represents the top 10%, the group that are already paying 59%of the taxes..... Lurker is claiming he is not in the top 10% but is still receiving benefit from the tax cut. However according to you "I think most people would argue, to keep the analogy that the tenth guy got all the reduction."

I'm not putting words in your mouth, I'm merely listening and applying common sense.... both of which seem to escape you

@DownCyndrome
Phrase it any way you like.

You are advocating stealing from the ultra successful who already contribute vast sums to support those who contribute very little.

Dadillac, the money should be spent efficiently, so that it has its intended effects. But the lower down the ladder the money is spent, the faster it recirculates. So it will be gov't employment, procurement, and benefit programs. Each of these types of expenditures results in money recirculating. The further down the economic ladder that they money is spent, the faster it recirculates.

The one who figured all of this out was John Maynard Keynes. And it worked extremely well, until people became disillusioned and there was back lash against the War on Poverty and the Civil Right's Act, and the Christian Evangelicals came out from under their rocks, and so Ronald Reagan got elected.

Keynes was really only talking about spending money to create employment. But he did say a few words about something like UBI.

During the 1960's, industrial technology having gone further, people started to see the necessity of welfare. The South was mechanizing its agriculture and ending its share cropping system. It could do mechanized agriculture with a much smaller force of wage labor. So people were being forced into the big cities, looking for employment which was not there.

But welfare creates another kind of a problem. Anytime you have any sort of needs tested program, then all of our politics quickly comes to revolve around the denigration of those recipients. They get pilloried.

So in the decades since, people far smarter than I have come to see that the best way is UBI.

So it is basically Keynesianism extended two steps further. The first step was welfare. The second step is UBI.

SJG

Third step is implosion

Without Keynesianism, we become like most every other society which has ever existed, we divide into the very rich and the very poor. It is impossible for democracy to survive that. And this is well evidenced by the election of DJT.

SJG

about Muller Investigation
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDz4CLOC…

I am not in a "very high" income range. My AGI was around $70,000 the past few years. But raising the standard deduction, when I was already using it, is an immediate tax reduction.

I am willing to go against the financial advice that I have seen, which says "skip a starter home and go immediately into a family home"

I would argue that most people will not stay in the same place long enough to benefit. You have to pay 23 years on a fat 30 year mortgage just to knock out half of it, and the odds that you will need to move due to family or job reasons is high.

Buy only the minimum house you need, and use a 20 or 15 year mortgage. A young person stands a much better chance in the future of being 50 years old like me, and living free of mortgage payments.

The ability to someday simply pocket the money that used to go to the mortgage and insurance companies, is such an awesome perk to have!

House prices are entirely determined by the tax code. So if you have more money, then the others who would buy it also have more money. So tax cuts accomplish nothing.

SJG

I have nothing against the poor I’d be very happy to see them become middle class issue is they think I’m holding yback it’s not true they’re holding themselves back

^^^^^^ ANd needs tested programs perpetuate this myth that the poor have some kind of a character disorder. If they want to be respected, they need to do it the same way any other self determining people has, by pilling up corpses.

SJG

"the money should be spent efficiently"

Government has never spent money efficiently.

SJG, how is it working for you.... you have been demanding respect around here for a while..... it just does not work like that, you have to earn respect

I do not demand respect, as that amounts to begging, and no one should have to earn respect either, as that is still begging.

But what I do do is make a public example of any and all who display disrespect.

And for that, I am greatly respected.

And you Daddilac sound like someone who lives in fear of being seen as someone who is not running fast enough in his squirrel cage. This is the downside of Capitalism, that it has given us a society filled with such morons.

SJG

Stride
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stride_(mu…

James P. Johnson and Jean Brady
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vG5zvZQh…

Alvin Lee – The Bluest Blues
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rB6OlJqV…

Lover Man
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhV9RC8Q…

Okay, can we all just agree that the answer to @founder's question is a resounding YES?

Obama kept a low profile, tried to stay to the center, but he got the first health care improvement passed since LBJ. That makes him a very good President.

SJG

SJG, you know absolutely nothing about me and only show your arrogant ignorance when you speak.

The truth is I'm not worried about how fast I am running in my cage as you call it.... I'm just trying to make sure the lazy thieves do not sneak in the middle of the night to steal what I have worked hard for while they did nothing. That these lunatics will not try to kill me in order to "pile up the corpses" just because I am more productive than them. And all I really want from you and your cohorts is to provide for yourselves, grow up and get a fucking job

And yes Flag I can agree to that

Poverty is endemic to capitalism as it is perpetuated in the United States. Poverty is a means of social control. Keep people obedient by making them realize that disobedience will land them in poverty ie you can be fired for going on strike and can't get unemployment insurance in many states if that's the reason. Poverty is a systemic problem. It doesn't come down to the individual. The belief that someone deserves to be poor is sick. The hardest working people are those doing jobs that the capitalist class refuses to provide living wages for.

I believe that actions have consequences.... if your actions are to not work, educate, and become valuable to society then you are choosing to be poor..... That is a choice and you cannot blame others for your poor choices. Take some personal responsibility, everything is not someone elses fault

Not everyone needs an education. There are jobs that are very necessary that require limited training. Those people work extremely hard at what they do, ie janitorial staff, dish washers, warehouse workers, etc. They deserve a living wage as does everyone else.

You can blame someone else for your poverty. When there is a system where its legal to exploit someone's labor for personal profits, yeah.... there's fault. Its not that you don't work hard, its that you live in an exploitive system.

I haven't thought this through totally, but...

Cars can take you from point A to point B, but some vehicles have more to offer than others.

Nobody seems to claim that that a Land Rover should cost the same as a Ford Fiesta.

The Land Rover is more dependable, can take you more places, has a better design, costs more to make, is more fun to drive, has 4 wheel drive, and has many other tangible and intangible benefits that the Ford Fiesta just can't provide.

What's more... People don't seem to complain that the Land Rover costs what it does. It deserves its low price tag because it doesn't offer anything that any other vehicle can provide. The Ford Fiesta also deserves its price tag. It is simple economics dictated by supply and demand.

A bicycle is awfully limited because it is made without an engine, but it can still be furnished with reflectors, a shiny bell and better tires.

Do what it takes to make yourself a Land Rover (or a Camry or a Ferrari or whatever) to establish your worth and don't settle for being a Fiesta.

I agree that the government should provide a bit of a safety net (insurance) for those who are incapable due to circumstances such as debilitating injuries, medical conditions, economic downturns, etc... (a bicycle or a vehicle that breaks down not due to negligence).

But not for those who are simply lazy or who make decisions that prevent them from making a more significant contribution (such as abusing the Loser Leaf, alcohol, or other drugs).

@DCill give you an answer that you’ll find difficult to understand given your relative young age and lack of real life experiences.
There is really very little real poverty in this country, it’s mostly relative poverty, most of the real poverty has been eliminated over the last fifty or so years, for example it’s mostly untrue that people are starving or live in places without toilet facilities, and it’s generally true that the persons that are the most disadvantaged are either elderly, or drug and alcohol addicted, the elderly that are at risk due to age related infirmity, should be helped, most of the drug and alcohol related are due to mental issues and need our help as well, but just because you can’t afford everything your heart desires isn’t poverty, and as such I nor any other well off person owes you or anyone else a living, you are responsible for your own well being and being middle class in this country is more of a mindset than an economic reality.

^ well said

People aren't things or commodities, they're human beings....

I believe in equality of opportunity NOT in equality of results

People aren't starving on the streets???? You need to get out more.

I take it you think going through trash provides a balanced meal

There is no equal opportunity in a society built on wealth condensation.

The problem with civilization is that we started out basically as "survival of the fittest". We have evolved to having the fittest now taking care of the weak. At some point in time, the weak will outnumber the fit. We are getting close.

And yes, Obama was worthless.

Social Darwinism has been out of style since Hitler tried making policies based on it....

It's not social Darwinism. It's reality.

I don’t know about Obama, but Randumbmember is a dog shit wanna be hippy liberal who cries foul while charging up windmills against anything practical or what makes sense in the political theatre.

Its Social Darwinism.

I'm sure you wouldn't be touting it if you weren't semi anonymous on here

Fittest has always been subjective. For example, in wolf packs.... beta males help raise cubs. Thus insuring their survival. Want to get down to biology, humans are pack animals. The goal of such a social arrangement is for everyone to survive and serve a purpose. The more you let die off the weaker your pack gets as a whole. That's why Neanderthals died off for example.

Evolutionary fitness is about spreading genes and maintaining group cohesion and gene variety. Not about inbreeding and letting members die off. And once you start interpreting evolution socially, like the Nazis did. You're treading very dangerous territory.

The number one rule in being successful in this world if living in the USA is have a skill in demand. As long as you are good at what you do and what you do is in demand you have a better than average chance of financially being comfortable.

Fitness to be is not just physically fit but well rounded.

There are still plenty of homeless people and people who need help. For me personally it is appalling when it happens to our Veterans or children but I will also state with experience sometimes the hardest part is getting people to want to change.

The question in my mind however is who can reach the most people and have the best success rate in providing everyone a chance at a better life....and in my mind it isn't always/normally/ the Government.

That isn't true. You can have education, skills, whatever. If well paying jobs aren't being created and prices are increasing at astronomical rates, you're fucked.

I know a few relatives who have given some assistance to homeless individuals... and discovered that even years of advice, car rides to the clinic, suggestions where to get assistance, that some people just won't put the effort forward to be self sufficient.

My own pet theory is that life has become too complex too quickly. 200 years ago a guy could be a farm hand, earn some basic cash doing manual work and sleep in a barn. A women might be a maid, and sleep on the back porch. People could do simple jobs and earn a subsistence living.

Life now has innumerable little rituals to adhere to. All kinds of forms to fill out, schedules to follow. Some people cannot cope with it all - technology and the rules of a highly structured society have moved beyond what some people are able to handle.

If you get bad credit, get caught in a minor crime, that record follows you. It is harder to move to a new town, and "start fresh".

Turning to drugs to forget one's problems for a little while just furthers the mess.

Icey--I disagree--it doesn't require an education based on college. If you are skilled and you do it better than most you are going to be in demand.

When is the last time anything ( except health care) has increased at an astronomical rate in this country?

The problem is when we have people going to college for degrees that are not in demand. Unemployment has been low the past two years--something Trump seems to get zero credit for happening...........but if it was Hillary chances are she'd be on the cover of Time Magazine for Person of the year.

Shut your fucking dick licker icey.... I'm sure that somewhere there is a homeless doctor or homeless lawyer.... well educated but screwed by the system. So we should make all our rules for these exceptions....... bull fucking shit.... we can make exceptions to rules but we should never make rules for exceptions.

That's what roe versus wade did.... ohhhh we have to legalize abortion because of these rape victims.... now our strippers are using abortion instead of contraception. The whole country is fucked because we make rules for the just in case exception. I would not support overturning roe v wade, you simply cannot put toothpaste back in the tube.

Most people that are poor are that way because they choose that way.... I'm sure you, random, DC, sjg, etc... can all come up with an example but those are exceptions to the rule.

You guys are debating a dogshit poster that is just posting for the sake of posting, a little poverty would do you a world of good fat boi, instead of food stamps how about don’t work don’t eat, or fuck housing assistance sleep in a refugee camp, in Mexico that you think is so wonderful guaranteed you’ll get nothing in return for your opinions you lazy slacker.
If you dislike capitalism so much go away, find some egalitarian society, that’ll take care of you with no contributions on your end, then when they rip you a new oriface you can talk about social Darwinism from the new asshole that you have.
You really should shut the fuck up, the more you post the less respect anyone who is respectable has for you, I find you to be a contemptible representation of what’s wrong with this society.

Notice how those calling for the government hand outs are admitted Loser Leaf smokers.

Getting something from our tax dollars that benefits the people, instead of endless wars and corporate welfare and handouts to the private sector....isn't asking for handouts. Its asking for justice and an end to the capitalist controlled gov to stop stealing from the poor and giving to the rich!

OUR TAX DOLLARS?????????????? Why does MY work create OUR tax dollars? Fuck you and that bullshit

My comments are not social Darwinism. If you could get your head out of your ass you would probably have a better idea of how the world works. Civilization has survived because the fit have been able to adapt to their environments both physically and intellectually. This, along with stupid government and a few other things has brought us to where we are today.

We now have societies that have those that adapt and take care of themselves to the best of their capabilities, and we have those that have not adapted and can't take care of themselves. They could have adapted thru education, learning a skill or developing a work ethic. We lack personal responsibility.

Social Darwinism is taking this information and using it to carve out niches to use to compare races against each other for superiority. Adapting to your environment to become successful is not race specific. The ability to adapt is available to all races. If you are going to go around spouting off, at least understand what you are talking about.

Just because you or others choose a life that is unproductive, doesn't mean those that those that do select a productive life should support you.

Yes, our tax dollars. Not the private sector's corruption and discretionary fund. Not the prison industrial complex or perpetual war machine.

AZ420, Hitler said the same thing. You're preaching social eugenics.

Nope I'm just advocating very late term abortion for anyone who cannot care for themselves. I have given to charity and paid my taxes but you liberals are still demanding more.... FUCK YOU I AM NOT GIVING ANY MORE.... The last dollar I made last year got taxed at a total of 67% between Federal, State, and Self-Employment. So I got .33 cents out of that dollar, fuck that

Yet you support spending that 67 cents on corporate handouts and war

Nope, I don't want to give that much... However for you to say that all of the 67 cents goes to war and corporate handouts proves exactly how out of touch with our country you actually are. Does the ACA fall under war or corporate handouts? Does food stamps fall under war or corporate handouts? Does welfare fall under war or corporate handouts? Does Planned Parenthood fall under war or corporate handouts?.... I can go on and on.... get some real information or just shut the fuck up whiny bitch

I'd prefer since I work for the money I make that I have the right to choose where and to what cause I give it to as a charitable deduction. Despite the MSM profile of conservatives there are a fair amount of people who do donate their time and their talents to help people in need.

I'll make the same statement I have before--would you give a meth head drugs? I alcoholic whiskey? Then why would you give a spending junkie more money to piss away? Our government has proven time and again they can't match the private sector in the ability to get the most value for the money they spend.

The Green New Deal being a ridiculous example.

It can't be that ridiculous. AOC says we only have 12 yrs left. And if I remember correctly, about twenty years ago, Al Gore said we only had 10-15 years left.

I'm curious if AOC isn't really Al Gore dressed in drag with some "corrective surgery".........although a case could be made a lobotomy would have been needed to really be corrective.

Is there any record of the two of them being seen simultaneously..........

This post brought to you by the same liberal logic being used by Congress.......

No, he was not.

Or at least not any more so than most of his predecessors for the last century.

DC, self employed people do not pay the 7.5% roughly social security tax that is capped at first 128 thousand earned.... instead they pay 15% with no cap into social security and medicare

Foreign Aid comes with political incentives, its not out of humanity.

I'd rather see homelessness end in the US, and see kids not going hungry or begging in store parking lots... than to see money wasted on soft coups and corporate PR incentives in Africa.

^ Just wait.

We are going to experience what Greece is going through. And it's not to far in the future. The national debt and the interest we pay on it is going to kill us.

^ I agree with Icey on something.

War isn't cheap.... the debt is a huge problem but most people are too dumb to realize it, they think it doesn't affect them

I can agree with this:

Foreign Aid comes with political incentives, its not out of humanity.

I'd rather see homelessness end in the US, and see kids not going hungry or begging in store parking lots... than to see money wasted on soft coups and corporate PR incentives in Africa.

With respect to the National Debt, it is a problem however I generally look at it as a percentage of GDP. Basically what we owe as a percentage of what we earn.

Breaking it down even further I may have a little over a million dollars in debt (mortgages and small loan on plane) if that were DC that would be a huge debt because he does not make much (not casting shade at DC just that he is 21 year old college student) but as a percentage of my income it is really a very manageable debt.

So for the USA our debt is 105% of GDP and trending down. The most it has ever been is 118% and the lowest is 31% so we are historically on the high side however our current trend is a reduction. I am NOT saying we are reducing debt, I am saying that our debt to income ratio is reducing, which is good.

Greece cannot print their own money, dipshit

And how would that help other than to give us a death spiral of inflation, like Venezuela.

Actually they can print their own money and there are also a handful of other options they could pursue.

They do own a press located in Athens or one of it's suburbs but it is only set up at the moment to press EU 10 notes.

The question is wouldn't this destroy the relationship with the ECB?

BTW this is an example of picking nits or looking for the upside down period and then screaming grammar error........I knew what you meant......but they CAN print money and they could retool their press to even print Drachmas

Regardless, printing more money won't help

I’d like to be able to print my own money;)

Krugman explains why not having their own currency was a disaster for Greece (he won the Nobel Peace Prize earlier in his career):

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes…


@Fruitcup, our own Fed created 3 or 4 trillion out of thin air during quantitative easing (after 2008 ) and we still have very tame inflation. Sarah Palin and Rick Perry said that Bernanke was "treasonous " for doing so.

Hmmm. You must be right.

Let's print a ton of money and do away with taxes completely. Hell, let's make everyone a millionaire and do away with poverty while we're at it.

You are such a dumbass sphincter.

Read the article. Governments flood the system with easy money during a crisis to stimulate GDP

Sphincter