Greeks Bearing Gifts....

[j_b]

Right back at you. Your "points" just smack of the usual whining about the world and how it's not fair or whatever. We live well in the US and you can succeed if you want (and actually try). Whine away about how you have no voice and are manipulated like a puppet by your bogeyman all you want.

 

hey meathead, just saying "whining" isn't supporting evidence for your lies. Time to pull your head out of your ass and notice that ~25% of US children currently live below the poverty line and the social elevator is broken, unless you consider earning less than your parents the best that could happen to you.

[JayB]

Apparently the charge of "relativism!" is only valid when applied to others. You can't make any determinations about better from worse? How is this anything other than a complete cop-out and a turn away from democratic politics?

 

I can make plenty of determinations and use empirical data to support them, but whenever I get in these conversations with people and I start cranking through the litany of things that are better than they used to be at some arbitrary point in the past - the response is never to challenge the numbers but to assert that something like, say, having fewer women die in childbirth or the eradication of smallpox is not "good" in any objective sense, and then go on to cite the litany of problems that we now have the luxury (in my view) of worrying about.

 

Like obesity. Exhibit A. Problem - yes. Better problem to have than chronic mass hunger or starvation? Yes.

 

Next.

[JayB]

Pretty sure it's "affect." But I always get these two confused.

 

http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/affect.html

 

Voting for "effect."

 

Effect in this case = establish.

 

"affect" change would be altering or modifying the said changes.

 

 

[j_b]

it's hard to look at any arbitrary point in the past and find someplace where I'd like to make time stand still, much less any time in history where the global aggregate of misery and suffering was lower.

 

it's somewhat like claiming one can't think of better times than during the great depression. Perhaps you ought to consider the reality of others and stop ogling at your belly button. Do you think you can handle that?

[j_b]

Like obesity. Exhibit A. Problem - yes. Better problem to have than chronic mass hunger or starvation? Yes.

 

because, of course, you can't think of moments in our nation when neither obesity or hunger were systemic problem.

[JayB]

it's hard to look at any arbitrary point in the past and find someplace where I'd like to make time stand still, much less any time in history where the global aggregate of misery and suffering was lower.

 

it's somewhat like claiming one can't think of better times than during the great depression. Perhaps you ought to consider the reality of others and stop ogling at your belly button. Do you think you can handle that?

 

Well - there's tens of millions of Indians and Chinese who have to been lifted from poverty far more severe than anything people in the US have had to endure for ages since whatever recent economic golden age you are pining for, so no sale for me.

 

When you are making these comparisons, you can't yank bits and pieces out of different points of time like you are at some sort of historical buffet to craft a utopia of your choosing. At least not if the goal is to make real comparisons between time A and time B, vs coming to the surprising conclusion that the present falls short of a time and a place that never actually existed.

 

 

[JayB]

Like obesity. Exhibit A. Problem - yes. Better problem to have than chronic mass hunger or starvation? Yes.

 

because, of course, you can't think of moments in our nation when neither obesity or hunger were systemic problem.

 

There was a time - but all things being equal it was worse than the present. Cold war, race riots, more pollution, vastly more poverty all over the globe, imprisoned behind the iron curtain etc, etc, etc. No thanks.

 

I'll take the present, fatties included.

 

[j_b]

Like obesity. Exhibit A. Problem - yes. Better problem to have than chronic mass hunger or starvation? Yes.

 

because, of course, you can't think of moments in our nation when neither obesity or hunger were systemic problem.

There was a time - but all things being equal it was worse than the present. Cold war, race riots, more pollution, vastly more poverty all over the globe, imprisoned behind the iron curtain etc, etc, etc. No thanks.

 

I'll take the present, fatties included.

 

but you were opposing obesity to hunger as if there were no alternatives and now you are moving the goal posts. why?

Edited June 22, 2011 by j_b

[j_b]

it's somewhat like claiming one can't think of better times than during the great depression. Perhaps you ought to consider the reality of others and stop ogling at your belly button. Do you think you can handle that?

 

Well - there's tens of millions of Indians and Chinese who have to been lifted from poverty far more severe than anything people in the US have had to endure for ages since whatever recent economic golden age you are pining for, so no sale for me.

 

When you are making these comparisons, you can't yank bits and pieces out of different points of time like you are at some sort of historical buffet to craft a utopia of your choosing. At least not if the goal is to make real comparisons between time A and time B, vs coming to the surprising conclusion that the present falls short of a time and a place that never actually existed.

 

 

your sudden concern for the welfare of others isn't convincing considering the rest of your rhetoric. You mention the Chinese and Indians lifted out of poverty and you ignore the masses of Africans, central Americans, etc whose socio-economic fabric has been destroyed or didn't you notice massive immigration to the US and Europe despite the great risks that it entails for these people? why do you think that is happening?

[j_b]

[video:youtube]v=A-4ALKGBbOE

[prole]

 

Thanks, Dr. Pangloss!

 

That's it? Toasters are cheaper now? Leaving mass extinction and ecological crisis aside, apparently you haven't noticed that in this country we're backsliding in a number of key areas; the ability for many to meet basic needs, like health care, and access to higher education is increasingly breaking down along class lines. Your "best of all possible worlds" is only possible when you ignore rising inequalities or factor them out of your equations (hence your love for disaggregated statistics and cherry picking). We've heard nothing on this data from you in the last 5 years but denialism and obfuscation so blatant and transparent that some here have openly wondered if you might be a sociopath. Why? Elitists of the past had no problems explaining where their loyalties lay and airing the ideological underpinnings of their thought. You and other neoliberals of today hide behind a supposedly value-neutral market, "the math", or conflate neoliberalism with economic development as a whole (as you do above) while the directly observable consequences and collateral damage of your ideas-in-practice mount. Like all the dead-enders of the past (British imperialists, Stalinists) you keep telling us that a more rigid application of your ideas is the cure for what ails. Yes, you can point to the folly of nostalgia for an imagined past, but you've little or nothing to offer for our future.

[JayB]

Thanks, Dr. Pangloss!

 

That's it? Toasters are cheaper now? Leaving mass extinction and ecological crisis aside, apparently you haven't noticed that in this country we're backsliding in a number of key areas; the ability for many to meet basic needs, like health care, and access to higher education is increasingly breaking down along class lines. Your "best of all possible worlds" is only possible when you ignore rising inequalities or factor them out of your equations (hence your love for disaggregated statistics and cherry picking). We've heard nothing on this data from you in the last 5 years but denialism and obfuscation so blatant and transparent that some here have openly wondered if you might be a sociopath. Why? Elitists of the past had no problems explaining where their loyalties lay and airing the ideological underpinnings of their thought. You and other neoliberals of today hide behind a supposedly value-neutral market, "the math", or conflate neoliberalism with economic development as a whole (as you do above) while the directly observable consequences and collateral damage of your ideas-in-practice mount. Like all the dead-enders of the past (British imperialists, Stalinists) you keep telling us that a more rigid application of your ideas is the cure for what ails. Yes, you can point to the folly of nostalgia for an imagined past, but you've little or nothing to offer for our future.

 

Woah Duane Gish!

 

Let's take these one a time!

 

Let's take education for starters:

 

 

Where's the crisis of access? When have opportunities for everyone to pursue a degree regardless of race or sex been better?

 

 

 

 

[j_b]

Yes, you can point to the folly of nostalgia for an imagined past, but you've little or nothing to offer for our future.

 

Nobody claimed there was a golden age, except for JayB who tries to put words into people's mouth, but the pauperization of the US middle class isn't imagined. It is real and well documented.

[j_b]

 

Woah Duane Gish!

 

Let's take these one a time!

 

Let's take education for starters:

 

 

Where's the crisis of access? When have opportunities for everyone to pursue a degree regardless of race or sex been better?

 

although your plot above reflects the rising trend in educational achievement post ww2 (which owes nothing to neoliberalism), it doesn't show the increasing access discrepancy between low and high income brackets.

Edited June 22, 2011 by j_b

[prole]

Where's the crisis of access? When have opportunities for everyone to pursue a degree regardless of race or sex been better?

 

although your plot above reflects the rising trend in educational achievement post ww2 (which owes nothing to neoliberalism), it doesn't show the increasing access discrepancy between low and high income brackets.

 

What ever you do, don't mention class!

 

For decades, college fees have risen faster than Americans’ ability to pay them. Median household income has grown by a factor of 6.5 in the past 40 years, but the cost of attending a state college has increased by a factor of 15 for in-state students and 24 for out-of-state students. The cost of attending a private college has increased by a factor of more than 13 (a year in the Ivy League will set you back $38,000, excluding bed and board). Academic inflation makes most other kinds look modest by comparison.

[prole]

 

There's at least one easy explanation...The U.S. was ground zero for both the massive housing bust and the financial crisis. It's no wonder that we're still reeling.

 

But there's a deeper, more troubling factor to consider, one that gets at the heart of political and economic differences between the U.S. and Europe. The rap against Europe, from a free market point of view, has always been its "inflexible" labor markets. Strong unions and strict government rules make it relatively difficult for European employers to cut their payrolls. In the United States exactly the opposite is true -- by the 21st century, American unions had been reduced to a shadow of their former strength, and employers faced dramatically fewer limitations on their hiring and firing policies...

 

...But in Europe, where laws, social mores, and strong unions prevented any such flexible reaction, the shock ended up substantially gentler. In Germany, restrictions on firings in combination with other labor market reforms resulted in a dramatically different outcome: Germany's unemployment rate actually fell while the U.S.'s was doubling.

 

The free market can be a harsh mistress. A strong social safety net, on the other hand, combined with some relative level of labor market inflexibility, seems to have cushioned the impact of the Great Recession on European workers. The millions of Americans who still remain out of work might want to think about which scenario looks more attractive, in hindsight.--more here.

[JayB]

-Where is the crisis? College has been getting more expensive for decades, and the percentage of people getting degrees has been increasing right along with it. 5% of the population was getting degrees at the civilizational apex that you lust after, and very few of them were women or minorities. Now 30% of the population is getting degrees, most of them are women, and there are more minorities enrolled in universities than ever before. This is armageddon?

 

This is what I get in every single conversation I have with people.

 

"X is getting worse."

 

-No it's not. Look at the data for X. X is getting better."

 

"Well, what about Y?"

 

This isn't Panglossian, it's perspective informed by actually taking the time to acquaint oneself with history. Life is better in more ways for more people now than at any other time in human history, and we have both more wealth and more tools to deal with whatever problems we have than we've ever had before.

 

 

 

 

[KaskadskyjKozak]

-Where is the crisis? College has been getting more expensive for decades, and the percentage of people getting degrees has been increasing right along with it. 5% of the population was getting degrees at the civilizational apex that you lust after, and very few of them were women or minorities. Now 30% of the population is getting degrees, most of them are women, and there are more minorities enrolled in universities than ever before. This is armageddon?

 

This is what I get in every single conversation I have with people.

 

"X is getting worse."

 

-No it's not. Look at the data for X. X is getting better."

 

"Well, what about Y?"

 

This isn't Panglossian, it's perspective informed by actually taking the time to acquaint oneself with history. Life is better in more ways for more people now than at any other time in human history, and we have both more wealth and more tools to deal with whatever problems we have than we've ever had before.

 

 

 

 

This is all about Prole whining about his student loan debt. Education should be "free"!!!

[prole]

 

Ya, duh!

 

Burden of College Loans on Graduates Grows

By TAMAR LEWIN

 

Student loan debt outpaced credit card debt for the first time last year and is likely to top a trillion dollars this year as more students go to college and a growing share borrow money to do so.

 

While many economists say student debt should be seen in a more favorable light, the rising loan bills nevertheless mean that many graduates will be paying them for a longer time.

 

“In the coming years, a lot of people will still be paying off their student loans when it’s time for their kids to go to college,” said Mark Kantrowitz, the publisher of FinAid.org and Fastweb.com, who has compiled the estimates of student debt, including federal and private loans.

 

Two-thirds of bachelor’s degree recipients graduated with debt in 2008, compared with less than half in 1993. Last year, graduates who took out loans left college with an average of $24,000 in debt. Default rates are rising, especially among those who attended for-profit colleges.

 

The mountain of debt is likely to grow more quickly with the coming round of budget-slashing. Pell grants for low-income students are expected to be cut and tuition at public universities will probably increase as states with pinched budgets cut back on the money they give to colleges.

 

Some education policy experts say the mounting debt has broad implications for the current generation of students.

 

“If you have a lot of people finishing or leaving school with a lot of debt, their choices may be very different than the generation before them,” said Lauren Asher, president of the Institute for College Access and Success. “Things like buying a home, starting a family, starting a business, saving for their own kids’ education may not be options for people who are paying off a lot of student debt.”

 

In some circles, student debt is known as the anti-dowry. As the transition from adolescence to adulthood is being delayed, with young people taking longer to marry, buy a home and have children, large student loans can slow the process further.

 

“There’s much more awareness about student borrowing than there was 10 years ago,” Ms. Asher said. “People either are in debt or know someone in debt.”

 

To be sure, many economists and policy experts see student debt as a healthy investment — unlike high-interest credit card debt, which is simply a burden on consumers’ budgets and has been declining in recent years. As recently as 2000, student debt, at less than $200 billion, barely registered as a factor in overall household debt. But now, Mr. Kantrowitz said, student loans are going from a microeconomic factor to a macroeconomic factor.

 

Susan Dynarski, a professor of education and public policy at the University of Michigan, said student debt could generally be seen as a sensible investment in a lifetime of higher earnings. “When you think about what’s good debt and what’s bad debt, student loans fall into the realm of good debt, like mortgages,” Professor Dynarski said. “It’s an investment that pays off over the whole life cycle.”

 

According to a College Board report issued last fall, median earnings of bachelor’s degree recipients working full time year-round in 2008 were $55,700, or $21,900 more than the median earnings of high school graduates. And their unemployment rate was far lower.

 

So Sandy Baum, a higher education policy analyst and senior fellow at George Washington University, a co-author of the report, said she was not concerned, from a broader perspective, that student debt was growing so fast.

 

Indeed, some economists worry that all the news about unemployed 20-somethings mired in $100,000 of college debt might discourage some young people from attending college.

 

A decade ago, student debt did not loom so large on the national agenda. Barack and Michelle Obama helped raise awareness when they spoke in the presidential campaign about how their loan payments after graduating from Harvard Law School were more than their mortgage payments.

 

“We left school with a mountain of debt,” Mr. Obama said in 2008. “Michelle I know had at least $60,000. I had at least $60,000. So when we got together we had a lot of loans to pay. In fact, we did not finish paying them off until probably we’d been married for at least eight years, maybe nine.”

 

Even then, Mrs. Obama said, it took the royalties from her husband’s best-selling books to help pay off their loans.

 

In 2009, the Obama administration made it easier for low-earning student borrowers to get out of debt, with income-based repayment that forgives remaining federal student debt for those who pay 15 percent of their income for 25 years — or 10 years, if they work in public service.

 

But if the Obamas’ experience highlights the long payback periods for student debt, their careers also underscore the benefits of a top-flight education.

 

“College is still a really good deal,” said Cecilia Rouse, of Princeton, who served on Mr. Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers. “Even if you don’t land a plum job, you’re still going to earn more over your lifetime, and the vast majority of graduates can expect to cover their debts.”

 

Even believers in student debt like Ms. Rouse, though, concede that hefty college loans carry extra risks in the current economy.

 

“I am worried about this cohort of young people, because their unemployment rates are much higher and early job changing is how you get those increases over their lifetime,” Ms. Rouse said. “In this economy, it’s a lot harder to go from job to job. We know that there’s some scarring to cohorts who graduate in bad economies, and this is the mother of bad economies.”

 

And there is widespread concern about those who borrow heavily for college, then drop out, or take extra years to graduate.

 

Deanne Loonin, a lawyer at the National Consumer Law Center, said education debt was not good debt for the low-income borrowers she works with, most of whom are in default.

 

Unlike most other debt, student loans generally cannot be discharged in bankruptcy, and the government can garnish wages or take tax refunds or Social Security payments to recover the money owed.

 

Students who borrow to attend for-profit colleges are especially likely to default. They make up about 12 percent of those enrolled in higher education, but almost half of those defaulting on student loans. According to the Department of Education, about a quarter of students at for-profit institutions defaulted on their student loans within three years of starting to repay them.

 

“About two-thirds of the people I see attended for-profits; most did not complete their program; and no one I have worked with has ever gotten a job in the field they were supposedly trained for,” Ms. Loonin said.

 

“For them, the negative mark on their credit report is the No. 1 barrier to moving ahead in their lives,” she added. “It doesn’t just delay their ability to buy a house, it gets in the way of their employment prospects, their finding an apartment, almost anything they try to do.”--from here.

 

 

[JayB]

I'm going to stick with education because I just don't have the time to do the Gish Gallop today.

 

-When the price of something increases more than people's ability to pay for it for decades, how does one explain that? It's only possible when you take money from somewhere else to fill the gap between the price and what people can afford to pay. The money from elsewhere in this case is grants, loans, and a variety of subsidies.

 

These are what have allowed more people than ever to pursue a degree if they want one. Unfortunately - it also means that universities can get away with charging more - or, alternatively, to "offer more" - so they have and they do. We've pumped so much money other than wages and savings into higher ed that it's vastly inflated the price structure.

 

Problem - yes. Worse than ever, armageddon, existential crisis? No.

 

 

 

[JayB]

Ya, duh!

 

Burden of College Loans on Graduates Grows

By TAMAR LEWIN

 

Student loan debt outpaced credit card debt for the first time last year and is likely to top a trillion dollars this year as more students go to college and a growing share borrow money to do so.

 

While many economists say student debt should be seen in a more favorable light, the rising loan bills nevertheless mean that many graduates will be paying them for a longer time.

 

“In the coming years, a lot of people will still be paying off their student loans when it’s time for their kids to go to college,” said Mark Kantrowitz, the publisher of FinAid.org and Fastweb.com, who has compiled the estimates of student debt, including federal and private loans.

 

Two-thirds of bachelor’s degree recipients graduated with debt in 2008, compared with less than half in 1993. Last year, graduates who took out loans left college with an average of $24,000 in debt. Default rates are rising, especially among those who attended for-profit colleges.

 

The mountain of debt is likely to grow more quickly with the coming round of budget-slashing. Pell grants for low-income students are expected to be cut and tuition at public universities will probably increase as states with pinched budgets cut back on the money they give to colleges.

 

Some education policy experts say the mounting debt has broad implications for the current generation of students.

 

“If you have a lot of people finishing or leaving school with a lot of debt, their choices may be very different than the generation before them,” said Lauren Asher, president of the Institute for College Access and Success. “Things like buying a home, starting a family, starting a business, saving for their own kids’ education may not be options for people who are paying off a lot of student debt.”

 

In some circles, student debt is known as the anti-dowry. As the transition from adolescence to adulthood is being delayed, with young people taking longer to marry, buy a home and have children, large student loans can slow the process further.

 

“There’s much more awareness about student borrowing than there was 10 years ago,” Ms. Asher said. “People either are in debt or know someone in debt.”

 

To be sure, many economists and policy experts see student debt as a healthy investment — unlike high-interest credit card debt, which is simply a burden on consumers’ budgets and has been declining in recent years. As recently as 2000, student debt, at less than $200 billion, barely registered as a factor in overall household debt. But now, Mr. Kantrowitz said, student loans are going from a microeconomic factor to a macroeconomic factor.

 

Susan Dynarski, a professor of education and public policy at the University of Michigan, said student debt could generally be seen as a sensible investment in a lifetime of higher earnings. “When you think about what’s good debt and what’s bad debt, student loans fall into the realm of good debt, like mortgages,” Professor Dynarski said. “It’s an investment that pays off over the whole life cycle.”

 

According to a College Board report issued last fall, median earnings of bachelor’s degree recipients working full time year-round in 2008 were $55,700, or $21,900 more than the median earnings of high school graduates. And their unemployment rate was far lower.

 

So Sandy Baum, a higher education policy analyst and senior fellow at George Washington University, a co-author of the report, said she was not concerned, from a broader perspective, that student debt was growing so fast.

 

Indeed, some economists worry that all the news about unemployed 20-somethings mired in $100,000 of college debt might discourage some young people from attending college.

 

A decade ago, student debt did not loom so large on the national agenda. Barack and Michelle Obama helped raise awareness when they spoke in the presidential campaign about how their loan payments after graduating from Harvard Law School were more than their mortgage payments.

 

“We left school with a mountain of debt,” Mr. Obama said in 2008. “Michelle I know had at least $60,000. I had at least $60,000. So when we got together we had a lot of loans to pay. In fact, we did not finish paying them off until probably we’d been married for at least eight years, maybe nine.”

 

Even then, Mrs. Obama said, it took the royalties from her husband’s best-selling books to help pay off their loans.

 

In 2009, the Obama administration made it easier for low-earning student borrowers to get out of debt, with income-based repayment that forgives remaining federal student debt for those who pay 15 percent of their income for 25 years — or 10 years, if they work in public service.

 

But if the Obamas’ experience highlights the long payback periods for student debt, their careers also underscore the benefits of a top-flight education.

 

“College is still a really good deal,” said Cecilia Rouse, of Princeton, who served on Mr. Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers. “Even if you don’t land a plum job, you’re still going to earn more over your lifetime, and the vast majority of graduates can expect to cover their debts.”

 

Even believers in student debt like Ms. Rouse, though, concede that hefty college loans carry extra risks in the current economy.

 

“I am worried about this cohort of young people, because their unemployment rates are much higher and early job changing is how you get those increases over their lifetime,” Ms. Rouse said. “In this economy, it’s a lot harder to go from job to job. We know that there’s some scarring to cohorts who graduate in bad economies, and this is the mother of bad economies.”

 

And there is widespread concern about those who borrow heavily for college, then drop out, or take extra years to graduate.

 

Deanne Loonin, a lawyer at the National Consumer Law Center, said education debt was not good debt for the low-income borrowers she works with, most of whom are in default.

 

Unlike most other debt, student loans generally cannot be discharged in bankruptcy, and the government can garnish wages or take tax refunds or Social Security payments to recover the money owed.

 

Students who borrow to attend for-profit colleges are especially likely to default. They make up about 12 percent of those enrolled in higher education, but almost half of those defaulting on student loans. According to the Department of Education, about a quarter of students at for-profit institutions defaulted on their student loans within three years of starting to repay them.

 

“About two-thirds of the people I see attended for-profits; most did not complete their program; and no one I have worked with has ever gotten a job in the field they were supposedly trained for,” Ms. Loonin said.

 

“For them, the negative mark on their credit report is the No. 1 barrier to moving ahead in their lives,” she added. “It doesn’t just delay their ability to buy a house, it gets in the way of their employment prospects, their finding an apartment, almost anything they try to do.”--from here.

 

 

Similar dynamics to the housing bubble. Price growth can exceed income growth for only so long, then people start to reconsider the costs and benefits.

 

To the extent to which this causes 18-year olds to consult loan amortization charts and income trajectories before uncritically accepting all of the claims about the benefits of going to college - there's a bit of a silver lining here.

 

The claims about the lifetime income trajectories of college graduates vs non-graduates are so thoroughly compromised as to be useless. Once you account for selection bias on the way into college and the distortions introduced by people who go onto a small subset of lucrative professions after college - it's not at all clear that the most college grads are in any position to bemoan the fate of the machinists, HVAC techs, backhoe operators, etc.

 

 

[tvashtarkatena]

The Gubmint Good/Gubmint Bad arguments typically presented here here leave me a bit dumber. The idea that an organization's charter - gubmint agency v corporation, for example, is, on its face, moronic. Certainly historical context and the people involved wouldn't come into play.

 

'The Issues' are similarly dumbed down here.

 

Take 'obesity'. First of all, obesity is only one aspect of a much larger metabolic syndrome - hypertension, inflammatories, diabetes, obesity, insulin resistance, and high triglycerides. It's caused increased consumption of sugar, particularly fructose - a substance our bodies are not evolved to metabolize without significant damage.

Government and corporations have played on both sides of the field here. Corporations market both very healthy, environmentally sound, and socially responsible foods, as well as Cherry Coke. Trader Joe's is awesome, Kroger Foods blows. Government launched the cheap shit food movement under Nixon (along with the War on Drugs...thanks, DICK) - agricultural subsidies, subsidies for the fast food and shit food production industries, relaxed regulation, a pro corporate FDA - in addition to mandatory labeling, a national food ingredients database, and public health education, and research grants; all of which have enabled those who give a fuck to live healthier.

 

Ie, please STFU already unless you're going to intelligently discuss something that isn't so meta-generically ideological that information exchange actually sucks perfectly good neurons out of the body and flushes them down some great and smelly swirling asshole that also operates in the reverse. This must be the mechanism behind the obvious retardation of the United States.

[prole]

Unfortunately, for many Americans the ability to take on massive debt to attain a higher education is exactly that: an existential crisis. Oh well, IKEA needs factory workers...

[KaskadskyjKozak]

Unfortunately, for many Americans the ability to take on massive debt to attain a higher education is exactly that: an existential crisis. Oh well, IKEA needs factory workers...

 

Life is tough.

[prole]

The Gubmint Good/Gubmint Bad arguments typically presented here here leave me a bit dumber. The idea that an organization's charter - gubmint agency v corporation, for example, is, on its face, moronic. Certainly historical context and the people involved wouldn't come into play.

 

'The Issues' are similarly dumbed down here.

 

Take 'obesity'. First of all, obesity is only one aspect of a much larger metabolic syndrome - hypertension, inflammatories, diabetes, obesity, insulin resistance, and high triglycerides. It's caused increased consumption of sugar, particularly fructose - a substance our bodies are not evolved to metabolize without significant damage.

Government and corporations have played on both sides of the field here. Corporations market both very healthy, environmentally sound, and socially responsible foods, as well as Cherry Coke. Trader Joe's is awesome, Kroger Foods blows. Government launched the cheap shit food movement under Nixon (along with the War on Drugs...thanks, DICK) - agricultural subsidies, subsidies for the fast food and shit food production industries, relaxed regulation, a pro corporate FDA - in addition to mandatory labeling, a national food ingredients database, and public health education, and research grants; all of which have enabled those who give a fuck to live healthier.

 

Ie, please STFU already unless you're going to intelligently discuss something that isn't so meta-generically ideological that information exchange actually sucks perfectly good neurons out of the body and flushes them down some great and smelly swirling asshole that also operates in the reverse. This must be the mechanism behind the obvious retardation of the United States.

 

Love the Billcoe-style interjection. Keepin' it spicy!