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Godd for you on all points, and I see nothing here which I have argued against. You contributed before becoming ill, you are reaping now the benefits of a society which you have assisted. So where is the conflict?
As for charity, perhaps my wording was inapproppriate. I don’t consider much of what our government spends as charity (any of it in fact) because our donations to other countries or indigent persons are taken from us upon threat of prison should we attempt to avoid paying these fines. Charity is freely given, and not the same as welfare at gunpoint. I do feel that the mentality of a government hiving out billions of dollars to feed persons in other nations which it could be spending to improve itse’d from within comes from a mentality that “our problems don’t exist but you little Blankovania are truly pathetic.”.
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I’m aware of the foreign assistance the colonial militias recieved, both in the form of training (From a Pole and a Belgian and another whose names I cannot remember, and to be honest I don’t recall ever being able to spell the Pole’s name but there is a statue of him in DC and I think he assisted in designing West Point’s defences) and in manpower (or more importantly Naval power) from the French, the militias were what it all hinged upon and who would have paid the ultimate price for failure (and many did pay in loss of property even if they survived after victory). The French and the Snapiards may well have gone to war against’ England on their own, but even if they had won it would have not helped the colonials, it may have even hurt them as later on neither Napoleon or the Spanish crown were big fans of America. Recall that the Spanish had a treaty with France forbidding the Louisana purchase and that even after the Monroe Doctrine they were keen on getting that land back as they figured Napoleon double did them in that sale to us. Not that i really know what any of this has to do with my point other than an excercise in conversations in historical observation, whichs is fun but distracting.
I believe in standards and measurable increments. As you are no doubt aware you can take the bar and practice law without ever having attended law school. Law school is the common method of preparing for the bar as it is common knowledge that a formal education helps with decision making later on. But I don’t recall insisting on a formal education or degree to practice franchise. You may recall that I have repeated that some contribution, any contribution really, is all equal in this matter. I said something like a “physicist contribuets as much as a road worker as both are needed”. Same goes for the fellow making your McLean Deluxe, but I doubt he has a degree or requires much of an education to do that particular job. But he is certainly contributing to society, in his service to the patrons on their way to do other contributions tasks and in taxes as well. By working a job, no matter how small it may seem, rather than working the system you are helping the big picture move along.
As for education = intelligence = wisdom. I may seem to be saying this, but I haven’t. Intelligence is self evident moreso in the uneducated. It’s fairly elementary for an educated person to get on reasonably well in our society, but look at Dave Thomas, a completely uneducated person who did very well. Much easier to measure his obvious intelligence than someone like Jeb Bush who may be govenor of Florida, but he was pretty much groomed for the (or a similar) job.
Wisdom is mas nix for me. Can’t measure it, otherwise it becomes something else. It seems to mean the ability to make the right decisions based on too little evidence, but I’m not sure. Can you explain it to me?
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I agree. Good thing I have not once ever said people should be FORCED into doing anything. I don’t even believe in forcing people to get jobs or eat or breathe, but I do believe in giving advantages to people who earn them. So I dunno why this paragraph exists unless its in reference to something someone else said or just stating your own opinion, which is fine by me.
I have the same math problems for different reasons. When I was in grade school our homeroom teacher was molesting girls and flunking the boys. All the boys were held back and it took parental intervention to figure out what was going on, so we all got skipped past third grade to catch up and I never gor basic multiplication or division. I had to take some pretty remedial math courses when I got to college in order to pass my basic prerequisites. Funny how there were nine years after this failure abd before college where I was just passed along in math witout being able to do long division (I’m pretty good with simple multiplication just because I memorized the 1-100 table).
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-I agree. I’m in favor of Latin as it it the foundation of so many other useful languages.
-I like the idea, but do you think elementary school kids can grasp logic or critical thought? It seems that I would not have been able to deal with either concept as I now know them at a young age. Maybe by 6th grade, but not in 1st grade unless they had some remarkable teaching techniques.
-To a certain extent this is what was done in my high school, but we abused it due to a lack of supervision. We had a “modular” schedule (patterned after technical school schedule) which resulted in the caffeteria being occupied virtually all day by students who did not happen to have a class during that period. Many students (myself included) skipped so much class we were amazed to know where we were even supposed to be at any given time. Amazing I still passed everything, but then I wrestled.
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- Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I have yet to see a concrete facist manifesto in here. Certainly there are elements that facists use discussed here, but more or less what you are probably referring to as “facist” more or less meets the technical definition of Martial or Appolonian, but in most cases not even that as I have yet to see anyone suggest dictatorship as a viable idea.
It comes off just as ripe and obvious when someone on the left cries “facist” and points to the middle as it does when some right winger living in a shack in Montana claims that the Liberal Jew Media Conspiracy has sent the Illuminatus after him and again points to the moderate middle.
The funny thing is, that while people on the left and people on the right can be very boisterous and obvious they are also only taking about half the heat and negative attention as someone firmly in the middle and who tries to state an opinion because both sides hate the middle.
