VLB, I think you simply picked a big pedantic catfight over something you fully understood I didn't mean, and now you're pulling every tangential argument into the conversation in the hope of creating a distraction from that.
My views are my views, and I don't think it was necessary for me to have to state that at every turn for it to be understood. I am not stating what is true for everyone. I am stating what is true for me. You choose to characterize passion as defensiveness, and I have invited you to do so if it pleases you. Doesn't make it true, and I wasn't being sarcastic. Your continual attempts to make this personal are something I don't understand.
I am discussing government within the context of the US Federal Government. I said that. I am not dragging the governments of Somalia, et. al into the mix. Let's stay on topic, shall we?
By the way, the Federal employees ARE getting paid. Retroactively. They have already been assured of this. And sometimes corporate employees don't get paid what they are promised, either. Remember Enron? People not getting paid become angry, whether employed by the government or privately employed by corporations. Or are you saying that government employees are somehow different?
Based on prior comments you've made, I think the essential difference between us is that you advocate change of OUR government via anarchy (purge, restructure and start from the ground up is the point you made, if memory serves). I advocate change of OUR government from within. In fact, I DO believe the only effective means of instigating meaningful change for the social good is from within. If that makes me a true believer akin to a Jesus freak, I'm cool with it. I've examined other methods and found them wanting -- including anarchy. It's just not possible with the populace we have, IN MY JUDGMENT.
So... let's just agree to disagree. There is no Debtors' Prison today, so I've no idea why you threw that into the soup. The PPACA will eliminate a lot of bankruptcies because it will no longer require hospitals to go after people who can't pay their bills like mob enforcers. (By the way, did you know 64% of bankruptcies in this country are due to a medical emergency for which the debtor was unprepared and couldn't pay?)
Government regulation has been severely gutted in the past decade and some. I have said we need to work hard to get corporate money out of our political system. Right now, they're running the show to an unbelievable degree. I have advocated earlier in this thread that Glass-Steagall should be fully reinstated. That would go some way toward placing some meaningful restrictions back on big business. Dodd-Frank helped a little, but without the Volcker Rule, it's still pretty toothless in some respects. Much more must be done, but as I keep saying, people must educate themselves about their government, how it works, what changed that they don't like (not the symptoms, the underlying causes) -- and then work like hell to change it again. IN MY OPINION.
YMMV, obviously. If you think anarchy is the better way, I hope you're doing everything in your power to instigate it.
My views are my views, and I don't think it was necessary for me to have to state that at every turn for it to be understood. I am not stating what is true for everyone. I am stating what is true for me. You choose to characterize passion as defensiveness, and I have invited you to do so if it pleases you. Doesn't make it true, and I wasn't being sarcastic. Your continual attempts to make this personal are something I don't understand.
I am discussing government within the context of the US Federal Government. I said that. I am not dragging the governments of Somalia, et. al into the mix. Let's stay on topic, shall we?
By the way, the Federal employees ARE getting paid. Retroactively. They have already been assured of this. And sometimes corporate employees don't get paid what they are promised, either. Remember Enron? People not getting paid become angry, whether employed by the government or privately employed by corporations. Or are you saying that government employees are somehow different?
Based on prior comments you've made, I think the essential difference between us is that you advocate change of OUR government via anarchy (purge, restructure and start from the ground up is the point you made, if memory serves). I advocate change of OUR government from within. In fact, I DO believe the only effective means of instigating meaningful change for the social good is from within. If that makes me a true believer akin to a Jesus freak, I'm cool with it. I've examined other methods and found them wanting -- including anarchy. It's just not possible with the populace we have, IN MY JUDGMENT.
So... let's just agree to disagree. There is no Debtors' Prison today, so I've no idea why you threw that into the soup. The PPACA will eliminate a lot of bankruptcies because it will no longer require hospitals to go after people who can't pay their bills like mob enforcers. (By the way, did you know 64% of bankruptcies in this country are due to a medical emergency for which the debtor was unprepared and couldn't pay?)
Government regulation has been severely gutted in the past decade and some. I have said we need to work hard to get corporate money out of our political system. Right now, they're running the show to an unbelievable degree. I have advocated earlier in this thread that Glass-Steagall should be fully reinstated. That would go some way toward placing some meaningful restrictions back on big business. Dodd-Frank helped a little, but without the Volcker Rule, it's still pretty toothless in some respects. Much more must be done, but as I keep saying, people must educate themselves about their government, how it works, what changed that they don't like (not the symptoms, the underlying causes) -- and then work like hell to change it again. IN MY OPINION.
YMMV, obviously. If you think anarchy is the better way, I hope you're doing everything in your power to instigate it.
