Entitlements - what's so bad about them?

Hi RAZD, it's always interesting to see non-creationists discuss politics! When referencing the "general welfare" clause, it's important to note "the intent of the framers" concerning it.

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In a letter to Edmund Pendleton, James Madison, the father of the Constitution, said, 'If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one ...' Madison also said, 'With respect to the two words 'general welfare,' I have always regarded them as qualified by the detail of powers connected with them. To take them in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators.' Thomas Jefferson said, 'Congress has not unlimited powers to provide for the general welfare, but only those specifically enumerated.'"

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Walter Williams On The General Welfare Clause of the Constitution. If you want to know the intent of the framers, the pursuit of it is both an entitlement and a right, but an achievement of it is NEITHER a right nor an entitlement.Excluding a few posters in this thread who put fourth no clear overall political position, non-creationist liberals outnumber non-creationist conservatives by about 13 to 1 in this thread. From about everything I've seen and read throughout news reporting and political commentary over many years, that seems to be a pretty predictable ratio. Yet it's far different ratio than that of the population at large of course, it's much closer to 50/50 there.Can I ask a few innocent, thoughtful questions without being flamed and called names? Probably not, but addressing them would probably be more fruitful than just another one-sided political thread. What do you think is the reason that non-creationists tend to be liberal? Is is due more to lack of religious belief, or to scientific discoveries? Coyote is not religious and is interested in science, what do you think he's missing?

I agree, but why? There has to be a reason for it. I can think of only one, that liberal mindsets, as well as science mindsets, are united in opposition to the claim that we were "endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights". I'm sure most here don't agree, but I'd like to see an equal or better explanation for it. Creationists are usually conservative, evolutionists are usually liberal. I realize that Coyote is an exception to the rule, but very small percentages of exceptions to rules don't change those rules.

It's not dead dogma to recognize the fact that today there are "wars and rumors of wars", and there were wars and rumors of wars in Biblical times. Some things don't evolve, including the ways populations of established countries/civilizations react to actions of government. Who defines exactly what a level playing field is, or what basic human rights are? There are countless different opinions of it - are politicians perfect enough to make the determination? What special interest makes that claim? The fact is, a very low percentage of the population (especially heads of households) make the minimum wage, most all workers with more than 6 months or a year of experience make significantly more. A huge percentage of your 75% who support a drastic increase in the minimum wage will feel good about themselves for only a short period, (especially those lower income ones, the ones making only a few dollars more than the minimum wage) when they suddenly find themselves paying $25.00 for a happy meal, that used to only cost them $8.00. It won't go up that much just because of minimum wage increase you say? It could, after the CEO gives himself a fat pay raise at the same time he's complying with minimum wage laws. CEO's are clever like that - they almost always find a way to personally benefit when the government meddles in their business. But I'd still like to see your opinion on why creationists are conservative. It's not because they are somehow in love with the top 1% income bracket. I agree those can be problems. But they are a tiny percentage of the overall picture of today's multi-trillon dollar U.S. government. Edited by marc9000, : No reason given.

The productive are EVERYBODY who isn't on a government handout program. They ALL pay for any type of redistribution of wealth. Don't agree?, because they're not targeted to pay, only the fat cats are targeted? The fat cats find a way to make those below them pay. They're WAY smarter than the politicians who propose ways to get their money.

Very true, and what is a significant contributor to the "tipping"? Government meddling? If profits are being paid to those who aren't providing much innovation, (or anything else) it's largely because they're protected by a thing called "corruption".There's less corruption in small government. Redistribution of wealth, corruption anyone? There's a lot of anger in this thread towards the top income earners, any anger against....George Soros? Al Gore?

The second example; that top management lost their jobs just like everyone else. Only if they owned the building, had a lot invested in tools and equipment, they lost a LOT more than employees who lost their jobs. Sure if it was a really big company, some big government corruption probably allowed them some kind of golden parachute. But that's not what happens to small businesses ( a couple hundred employees or less) that go under because of poor management.Your first example, a good businessman, redistribution of wealth penalizes him for things that aren't his fault.

They got transferred and got bonuses for running a branch of the corporation into the ground? When these shrill, Democrat talking points make no sense, I tend not to pay too much attention. The way you've described this one certain scenario, the people responsible for this mismanagement didn't get any more hurt financially than the common employees because this was only one branch of a much larger corporation. It's far more common for a 60 to 80 employee company to be completely self contained, with the owner taking a life destroying bath if he runs it in the ground. He's an example of the vast majority of small business owners all across the U.S., someone who's honest and treats his employees fairly. He takes the SAME HITS as the top 1% income bracket that you and just about every other evolutionist hate, as you try your best to saddle them all with more and more government regulation. That happens in some companies, but in some companies, it goes the other way. I knew a fairly well off owner of a residential roof truss manufacturer, about 40 employees. The recent housing bubble burst probably cost him more than his 40 employees combined. They all went out and got other jobs - he lost about everything he had. "Because of tax laws"? written by government interests? The buying up and trashing of companies game is a very small part of the entire U.S. economic picture.

Solutions for what? While it's true that the U.S. doesn't produce much in the way of raw materials anymore because of government regulations, and has to borrow millions of dollars per day to fund its handout programs, it's still an okay place to live. There are still more people who try to get into the U.S. than try to get out. All too often, government "solutions" cause far more problems than they solve. The best way for them to react to unjust corporations is stop buying its products. Not possible in the case of oil companies, power companies, auto companies? Maybe it would be possible, if government wouldn't regulate out competition for these entrenched monsters. I don't claim to know what a level playing field is for every company in every situation. But just going by life's experiences, I know that women sometimes appreciate the flexibility to take off work for a while for things like childbirth, taking care of a sick child, working from home, keeping irregular hours, many other things that working mom's appreciate. Some women like to do things that men normally do, even though they know full well that they can't do it quite as quickly or efficiently as a man because of physical strength issues. When government strips companies and their employees the ability to negotiate these things among themselves, companies are going to do the logical thing, hire more, (or all) men, and leave the women unemployed. Then the unemployed women get a handout, and vote for Democrats! It IS the issue, government mandates controlling it affects everyone, the prices of goods and services everyone has to pay for, and the companies who produce them. It's not the government's business to involve itself in this type of thing. It's not constitutional, and it's far from being the only problem that many people must deal with daily in their private lives. But you're advocating the opposite! The authoritarianism of government is what you advocate, as opposed to the un "authorized" freedom of working, running a business etc on one's own decisions, not decisions from government. They're free to base those decisions on any religion they want, or no religion at all. Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Marco Rubio, people can easily compare the liberty and constitutionalism they advocate as opposed to the ever increasing government authoritarianism of Obama. Off topic. I'm no advocate of huge military spending, but like it or not, the U.S. is the policeman of the world, and the world is a better place for it. But this topic is wealth re-distribution.

What does redistribution of wealth have to do with science? I know there is no way, because you don't have one. I don't need Christianity to determine that liberalism is destructive to the U.S. as it was founded, I only need the writings of the founders and the knowledge of human nature to tell me that.

I know they can, it's called corruption, and it's a lot harder for them to do if the government is small and defined. I agree 100%. And I understand that with the increasingly complex materials we have to work with, (cars and trucks as opposed to horses, as only one example) government must grow to accommodate those things. But when government redistributes wealth and tell employers what they'll pay female employees, it's gone just a little too far. Or maybe a LOT too far. And penalizing innovators by redistributing their wealth doesn't drive fourth their innovation. Thanks for mentioning them, that's more than any of my U.S. opponents here have done.

I've come to the conclusion over many years that almost no one from either political side has much comprehension of the thought processes from the other side. Sometimes I hear a talk show host like Limbaugh claim that they understand how liberals operate, but I can tell that he's often just as mystified as me about how they can possibly say the things they say.I don't see how you can say that it makes no sense when I point out that government regulations are evenly applied across the board, that greedy business owners, as well as honest business owners, are all required to succumb to government regulations in the same way. Read some of your helpers posts here. (message 50, with 5 green dots)

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when your taxes were used to buy expensive cars, houses and boats by cock suckers who manipulated a system and destroyed the lives of many citizens?

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Listen to Ed Shultz sometime, James Carville. It IS hate. A company that had been bought out by a branch, so it became a branch. That's what I said, and you still didn't explain the rationale behind why a company would reward money loss and failure. (only the government does that, and there's a reason, it does it for Democrat votes) If both involved parties agree to it, YES! It's not the government's, or the general public's business.

"Free market ideologues" versus "big government ideologues" - as a conservative I think the free market ones pose less of a threat to society than big government ones, because they don't seek the same level of political power and coercion. The United States, before, and up to about 1960. Here's a couple of paragraphs from your above link;

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Over the last century, overall government spending in the United States has increased substantially from about seven percent of GDP in 1902 to about 35 percent of GDP in 2010. Major spikes in spending occurred in World War I and World War II.

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When broken down by major function, the history of US government spending as a percent of GDP shows a slow and consistent increase in education spending; it shows the spikes in defense spending during World War I and World War II, and the sustained high level maintained during the Cold War. Spending on welfare shows a clear takeoff during the Great Depression and a modest decline following reform in 1996. Spending on pensions (primarily Social Security) begins to show up in the 1950s. Health care spending takes off after the birth of Medicare and Medicaid in the 1960s and shows sustained growth ever since.

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Seven percent in 1902 - of course society has gotten complex enough for that to go up somewhat by today, maybe double. But not 35% - not much of a free country anymore IMO. The United States, 100 years ago. Maybe not, in every single case. But they are in a lot of cases. Wealth accruers (is that a word?) are just as diverse as any classification of people in the U.S. (or many other countries). That's one of the biggest problems with the political left in the U.S. - they tend to lump them all together as they try to redistribute their wealth. Maybe a small percentage of the "rich" (the rentiers) can afford having yet another chunk of their wealth confiscated by government, but a lot of the other "rich" (the risk takers) cannot, subsequently they take less risk, and innovate less, and employ less middle and lower class. The paragraph you quoted doesn't recognize the existence of those rich risk takers who haven't yet made it that far. Those innovators who haven't yet made it that far are all over the map in their desire to get there at all. Many don't even care about it, and many don't make it there, even if they want to. I agree, capitalism is far from perfect. But there's nothing better. Including appointing elites like politicians or bureaucracies to regulate it all to make it perfect. Have you ever heard of U.S economist Thomas Sowell? Here is one of his many essays that address those who seek to do things like redistribute wealth. I won't c/p it all, but here are a few highlights;

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"Fairness" is one of the great mantras of the left. Since everyone has his own definition of fairness, that word is a blank check for the expansion of government power. What "fairness" means in practice is that third parties -- busybodies -- can prevent mutual accommodations by others.

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and

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Such thinking -- or lack of thinking -- is not new. Back in the 18th century, Adam Smith wrote of politicians who devote "a most unnecessary attention" to things that would work themselves out better in a free market.

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What is conventionally called "the free market" is in reality free people making their own mutual accommodations with other free people. It is one of the many tactical mistakes of conservatives to use an impersonal phrase to describe very personal choices and actions by people when they are not hamstrung by third parties.

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one more

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The fatal attraction of government is that it allows busybodies to impose decisions on others without paying any price themselves. That enables them to act as if there were no price, even when there are ruinous prices -- paid by others.

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Millions of people's lives are made worse in innumerable ways, in order that a relative handful of busybodies can feel important and superior. Artificially high land prices in those places where busybodies reign politically, based on land use restrictions, make housing costs a crushing burden on people of average incomes.

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Why do advocates of wealth redistribution have such a huge mistrust of ALL the rich, including innovators, yet have such a blind trust of those who want to do the decision making on just how it will be done? Those who seldom pay a price if their decisions are failures?

That depends on who's doing the calling, what it's used for and who is paying it. And it is a limited power, the 9th and 10th amendments are a small part of a host of proofs of that. These things are called evidence . The word "evidence" doesn't seem to be quite the same favorite word for evolutionists, when they are trying to promote big government in the U.S. It's a brief, concise document, undoubtedly written that way to help control variations in it's interpretation. But after 200+ years, combined with the organization that atheism now has, interpretations of it are reaching amazing new lows. Some of the more honest Democrats today try to say that it's outdated, while some of the funny ones try to claim that it actually supports a massive, unlimited government. It's not that much of a threat, because it's so obviously phony, even to many elementary school science students.

Because no one person or group has a superior knowledge of what is pragmatic and right. Not through the creation of new laws (political power) that lessen the liberty of the public at large. That's the big difference between them and big government advocates. Yes, and there are multiple reasons. Some don't like the truth, while some others are ignorant of it. That's the way it's supposed to be, and it still works somewhat. But it's slipping away in the U.S., party from corruption, and partly from a tyrannical majority that is getting more and more used to free stuff, at the expense of others. Unions (which I have little issue with) and taxation are only a small part of the overall picture in liberty lost over the past 60 years. Corruption and increasing government bureaucracies (heavily involved in redistribution of wealth) are the main problems IMO.

There was no EPA, and the scientific community with all it's global warming scares didn't have near the political power it does today. The news media did a pretty good job of reporting facts, people then wouldn't have stood for all the news politicizing that goes on today. We were pretty busy building a new interstate highway system, got it all basically done in about 12 years. Today, it's taking way longer than that to replace ONE interstate bridge. (I-75 linking Ky and Oh.)

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Tax rates were high in the 1950s, we often hear, yet economic growth boomed. So why should we fear higher taxes today?

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One answer is that taxes in the 50s weren’t really high. Yes, the top marginal tax rate was 90%, but it applied to almost no one. What matters more is the average marginal tax rate — that is, the average rate paid on the next dollar of earned income. That figure tells you more about the incentives facing individuals working in the economy.

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And based on data from a 2009 study by Robert Barro and Charles Redlick, the good old days in terms of economic growth were also pretty good in terms of taxes. Barro and Redlick calculated average marginal tax rates inclusive of federal income taxes, Social Security taxes, and state income taxes. In the 1950s, the average marginal rates equaled just 25%, versus 37% in the 2000s.

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http://www.aei-ideas.org/...taxes-really-higher-in-the-1950s ALL of those philosophies of the 50's? You wouldn't like it.