With apologies for the extreme length of the following rant. Feel
free to ignore it and find something funny elsewhere.
G.H.
--- In OliveStarlightOrchestra_at_yahoogroups.com, "7visions"
<7visions_at_p...> wrote:
> Late post here to these comments...
>
> Who are "We the People"? It seems like "We the People" are pretty
> divided....
>
> >
We The People have a lot more in common than most of us want to
believe. The problem is We The People have pretended to be lots of
different groups, and in order to have a sense of Us vs Them we have
to make sure that any Non-Overlap is exaggerated while our
similarities are ignored or brushed aside.
"Yeah, we disagree on ______, but we can still work together to get
____ done because it's something we both agree on." What ever
happened to THAT mentality?
> the idea what We The People want them to do with OUR money.
>
> OH yes... "We the People" seem to think that MOST money goes to
foreign aid.
Never said foreign aid was horrible. I meant our vast bureaucracy is
disorganized and wasteful, and they much prefer giving a little
something back to those who *ahem* gave them a little "help" along the
way. The point was, let the elected leaders know what we think is
important, whether that's foreign aid, fighting terrorism, the
abortion issue, health care, education, whatever. That little section
on the tax form would be a huge survey of the entire nation. What is
it we REALLY want?
> The fact that this has been disproven over and over does no good, it
suits
> the people's prejudice. as far as I am concerend there is ENOUGH
pandering
> to "We the People".
Pandering to their votes, maybe, but not to the people's needs. How
much was spent in electioneering and advertising over the last year?
What if that went into the budget instead? No more deficit.
It helps explain the last election
>
> Polls show that "We the People", esepcailly in the "Red States" want
a lot
> of things, that I am willing to guess that you really don't. .
Fine. I see no problem with wanting something (for instance, a
certain type of government or a certain law) that someone else doesn't
want. Talk about it. Calmly. Logically. Together. Hold the
accusations. "What can we do with/about _____?" "What are the long
term effects?" I'm totally sick of the "us vs them" mentality.
Remember, we
> are a Republic NOT a Democracy... Call me elitist but that is just a
fact
>
> "Our Glorious Government Workers"
>
> Old hackneyed stereotyped scapegoat, That thinking is beneath you.
My apologies for the seeming insult. Really. I wasn't talking about
*government-paid* workers who really do work hard and try their best.
I was referring to our Gloriously Elected "workers" who seem to put
more effort into getting (re-)elected than making difficult decisions
which might not be popular because it could lose their precious voter
base. (Or worse - loss of funding from special interests.) No one
takes a long-term view of things when they have to constantly worry
about whether or not they will be popular in 2 - 4 years. Campaign
funding. War chests. Conventions, political ads, bumper stickers.
Gah!
Most of
> those people work quite hard to support their families. And the ugly
truth
> is that this particular stereotype is based on people's reactions to
most
> urban government workers, and I wonder just what ethnic group they
are. I am
> not saying that you are guilty of such thinking, but that is the
historical
> and cultural root of that kind of thinking. It is CODE, which is how
bigotry
> is expressed in polite America. ( like "cultural elite" for Jews,
and "moral
> values" for gays.)
As stated above.
>
> Besides, how many people who comment on "government workers" ever
comment on
> the government CONTRACT workers who labor on so many military
boondoggles?
> Not an easy target. It would be too impolite to question why.
>
Government contracts can be some of the most wasteful things of all.
A certain sum of money is provided, the contractor does some work. If
they use up the entire fund, then they might be given some more. If
they stay UNDER budget and there's money left over at the end of the
year, they get punished by getting LESS the following year. Where's
the incentive for saving tax dollars?
> Besides, this goes on everywhere. A member of our school board
recently
> lambasted the "lazy" classified employees of our District. Easy
target. But
> damn unfair. Those people are the backbone of our schools. But
nobody would
> EVER crticize us teachers. We are just sooo perfect, don't you know?
??? :)
> We must be. We went to College unlike that riff-raff from
Classified!!!!!
>
> Lenny "Government Employee" Shaw
What's a classified employee? Are they the non-teachers (ie,
janitors, office staff, etc)? I wouldn't exactly call them a
backbone, but I also agree that it would be damn hard to run a school
of any size without them. More like the knees of the system. Yeah,
you could still get around without them. But it would be damn
difficult.
--G.H.
Received on 2004-11-23 21:47:13
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