I will look through this later, I was looking for a The Young Turks video that summarized what I was talking about which would be easier for LonesomePolecat to check out.
It’s the U.S. equivalent of “social-democratic,” is what it is. As distinct from “democratic socialist” or any other kind, and as distinct from “liberal”. At least, that’s the position I argue in this old GD thread.
I think the GOP/conservative movement base is accrued additively from the most diehard constituents of various losing positions: They find people who take a minority, or “losing” view on something, get them fired up enough to make a deal with other such groups–with whom they disagree–and get them to vote against their own interests and contrary to most of their own beliefs for the sake of their one passionate opinion, whether that’s flat taxes, white supremacy, banning abortion, or what have you.
Then there are the contrarians who like taking the unpopular position on everything. And then suckers who buy into the idea that there’s a consistent conservative ideology, and they’re *supposed *to love military spending while deploring the welfare state, and stuff.
People say they favor all sorts of things. Until you ask them to pay for those things. The real test is how much people are willing to raise their own taxes in order to provide the types of services you’re talking about. Now, that doesn’t affect things like SSM, which isn’t much of an economic issue, but most of the things the government does costs money. If you’ve got a cite that shows people will line up their wish list with their willingness to pay, then I’ll believe it.
Do we have to go over this again? Homeschooling is a response to all sorts of dissatisfactions about public school. There’s a big conservative Christian segment and there is also a big leftwing, ‘alternative’ segment that comes from the standpoint that classrooms reward conformity and squelch creativity. Lots of ‘Back to the Landers’ in both categories, interestingly. Then there are people who just have kids who can’t fit into the standard public school classroom format – too gifted, too twitchy, getting bullied, special needs, whatever.
Speaking as someone who homeschooled one kid for a few years.
Not to mention that homeschooled children represent only about 3% of the total. if you look at something like evolution, we have about 50% of Americans not accepting it. And most of those were educated before the homeschooling boom of the last decade or so. This is a tiny blip on the radar.
Okay, I found a cite that says mormons homeschool less than the general population, but I would like to find another source. On one hand they have big families so homeschooling would be very expensive, on the other I know lots of mormons have problems with the standard cirriculum.
It seems I was right about the evangelicals though:
The evangelicals VASTLY outnumber the people not putting their kids into school because they are “alternative”. They are a drop in the bucket compared to evangelicals who don’t want their kids learning about evolution.
NO. Wages have stagnated for decades due to Reaganomics and waiting for the trickle down. The middle class shouldn’t shoulder any more of the burden for the country’s bills, and the poor obviously don’t have any money to spare.
Apparently the rich don’t really believe in the tax cuts they give themselves since they’re not asking themselves to pay for them right?
Stupid is the wrong word, and it’s scary as hell why that’s true.
Never before in my 40+ years on the planet have I seen so much real intellect, eloquence, and reasoning put to the service of ignorance and closed-mindedness. Smart people are making decent livings generating, propagating, and defending rank bullshit. Still others (including right here on the Dope) are doing so seemingly pro malo publico, in a stand on principle - or perhaps against principle.
Perhaps it’s an even greater mistake to underestimate the number of intelligent assholes in America. Or the spread and power of their influence.
I dispute your conclusion that the Democrats are only working for America and the Republicans are only working against it (well, I agree that the Republicans are mostly working for lobbyists to make the rich richer, but I disagree that the Democrats are much different).
I’m not going to compile a list of laws that the Democrats lobbyists have caused to be passed, because frankly, I don’t care that much, but if you follow the money, it looks like the Democrats are as much in bed with lobbyists as the Republicans, and in my experience, that means that the Democrats pass laws that favour lobbyists just like the Republicans do. The proof is in the pudding, too - if the Democrats were just passing laws that favoured the American middle class rather than just rich Americans, I think you’d see conditions in the US significantly improving, and from this outsider’s seat, that doesn’t seem to be happening.
Name one democratic country in the world where this is true of education. (We’re not talking about healthcare here.) Remember, the proposition is that kids be forced to attend public school, not making sure all kids are able to go to public school. Those are two completely different things, and the latter is already the case in the US as it is most of the developed world.
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Huh?
Well, I think education is provided free of charge in MOST Democratic countries but not in all. Some public education systems charge tuition.
Or are you asking if anyone forces children to go to school?
Homeschooling is illegal in most places.
“some countries have highly regulated home education programs as an extension of the compulsory school system; others, such as Sweden and Germany,[42] have outlawed it entirely.”
From my experience, children are more likely to believe a complete stranger than their parents. But maybe you’re right and most kids end up thinking what their parents want them to think.
Your mother probably associates Republican with folks like Eisenhower and Democrats with folks like Gerorge Wallace.
Getting a bunch of poor people to support tax cuts for the rich? Now THAT’S leadership!!!
