As I was typing this one single question, I thought of more:
Does your definition of “poor” predicate itself on things needed to live? Or does it involve definitions based on relative wealth?
If the government capital “O” Ought provide for the poor, does this include those who choose to put themselves in that group of people defined in question #1?
I.E. If a person chooses to be poor, is the government still bound by the Ought?
If you could compel a citizen to work in a pure socialist state, why can’t you do the same in this one?
I’m a weird guy. I’m a weird adult who grew out of a weird kid.
I had weird hair growing up, and played weird games. My most favorite thing to do as a kid was to play D&D. I remember getting that very first blue Dungeons and Dragons rulebook. Remember? Back when an Elf was a class and the levels went ALL the way up to 3?
Crazy times.
I played that game until I was 4 years out of college. And even now am anxiously awaiting the day when my son understands how to play the PokieMon cards I’ve bought him.
I wasn’t very good at games with a ball; I can catch anything thrown within 10 yards of me and can hit the eye of a bird flying, but I SUCKED at those games. But, for a small farm town kid in farm country I could run forever. In track I won more races than I didn’t.
I went to church, Sunday school and sang in the choir until the day I graduated. I delivered Easter morning sermons at 5:00 AM. I marched in the band [though I did quit after two summers of marching in Minnesota heat in those hot as hell wool uniforms and those ugly black buffalo hats]. I loved debating in school, was in theater and ran the computer lab during study hall.
It was great. All of it. And I wouldn’t trade it for all the world.
But I paid a price; a massive price.
Beginning in the 5th grade I started getting picked on. While fast, I was small; until I was 33 I weighed 137 pounds. Marching in the school band with your head in the Monster Manuel while the cool guys played on the varsity basketball team didn’t make a lot of friends [though it made the BEST of friends]. Not until years later did the torture really stop, and even then it didn’t really stop. It just slowed down. I still remember opening my locker and reacting with horror that the entire contents had been doused with water; my Honor Cords [you know what honor cords are?] were in there. Thankfully the perpetrator had displayed some form of human sympathy and took ’em out before the dousing.
I was hit, kicked, pushed and taunted. Heck, I even had my hair set on fire once coming back from a class trip. The things you see in the movies…..they’re real.
I still remember walking down the empty second floor hall in the middle school when I realized one kid in front of me. One in back. I fought as hard as I could, but I couldn’t stop ’em from pinning me to the locker and feeding me dog food.
Good times.
Oh, and to ensure that I would continue to participate in this mandatory fun, my dad was the 8th grade math teacher. The deck was stacked against me. In science class it got bad one day. 2-3 guys [it was never just one now that I think of it. cowards] were kinda taking turns, like crows on road kill. It went too far that morning and I actually retaliated; I hit the kid in front of me. That kinda calmed things down. After class, the teacher pulled me aside and mentioned that he saw what had happened. I was relieved, ’cause it didn’t FEEL like the bastard saw it while it was going on. He then looked at me dead in the eye and expressed his disappointment that I had hit that kid; he expected better. I bit my tongue–that made TWO of us. Ass.
But at least I didn’t have to worry about a girlfriend 😉
I knew back then that this wasn’t “fair”. That I really didn’t do anything that deserved this. Heck, I didn’t DO anything. I read The Trilogy, all four of ’em*, during class and just stayed out of the way. I went to class, went to Greyhawk, went to church, went to track and went to bed.
I suspected then, I continue to believe even now, that those kids didn’t know what they were doing. I bet if you were to ask those boys, now men, they wouldn’t remember the stories. In fact, if I were to see ’em in town, we’d have beers and talk about the GOOD times. As if.
And so it is, as I read stories of kids in school today being bullied, that I wonder how I’m gonna teach my own kids. What I’m gonna say, what I’m gonna do. What lessons will I make them endure. My own father let me experience every one of ’em. He didn’t intervene even once that I knew of. In fact, only one time did I see an exchange that let me know he knew what was going on.
Down the street were some brothers. And one day they were picking on my sister. We told dad and he went over and tried to talk those boy’s dad. The man refused to believe that his kids could’ve done that, “Not my boys” was what he told my dad.
The next night my brother and I took it out on those brothers at the ice rink. Looking back I suppose it was us that was the brute then. Anyway, it wasn’t long before that man came knocking on OUR door and asked my dad to explain why his sons would have done what we did to his boys. I still remember dad saying, “That wasn’t my boys. My kids wouldn’t do that.” He closed the door and simply went back to his paper. Not even one word, for or against, was said.
I think that I’ll try, somehow, to explain to my kids that growing up is a lot like life. It isn’t not getting knocked down that’s the goal, THAT is gonna happen. It’s all about the getting back up.
My heart breaks for those kids getting picked on today. I just read a story of another girl who has been bullied and the hell her parents are going through. For those kids that don’t know where to turn and who to talk too, [God knows they most likely don’t even KNOW about Styx] I just wish they could see their 26 year old self. Still weird, still geeky. But okay with the world and their place in it. But if I could talk to ’em, I know what I’d say; “Get up! Get back on your feet! You’re the one they can’t beat and you know it.”
Anyway. I don’t remember what the point was except maybe that life teaches how to prepare for life. Yesterday’s wimpy kid is going to be tomorrows Libertarian champion maybe? The geek makes good maybe? The ugly duckling gets the hot wife perhaps? I dunno know.
Maybe it’s just to remind us that mean people suck.
* Rings, Lord of the; Unbeliever, Thomas Covenant the; Lance, Dragon and Foundation, Just
“People on twitter might be joking, but in all seriousness, we would see a bigger boost in spending and hence economic growth if the earthquake had done more damage.”
Right.
Reminds me of this:
Milton Friedman went to Asia to visit a jobs project; it seems that a canal needed to be built. When he arrived on the site, he witnessed that the workers were using shovels and wheelbarrows. He asked the government administrator why there wasn’t any heavy earth-moving machinery? The official responded that this was a “jobs program”.
Milton responded, “Well, if that’s the case, why not give them spoons and buckets?”
This sums up my view of why the Left is so very critically concerned about the whole warming of the globe:
The solutions proposed by the left aim to leverage this problem to build the economic order they have failed to achieve by other means.
Exactly!
It would be easier to listen to the Liberal solution to this problem if it didn’t sound EXACTLY like the normal meme of taking resources from the evil rich and giving it to the victimized poor.
Pat Summitt, the longtime women’s basketball coach at Tennessee who has won more games than any other major college coach, said she forgot things at crucial points in games at times last season and struggled to keep track of when meetings were scheduled. She grew so confused that on a few days she simply stayed home from work.
It was not until after the season ended that she sought a medical diagnosis and learned she has symptoms of early onset Alzheimer’s disease.
You have to win to govern. And winning vs. losing in political races is a zero sum game. When your opponent gets more votes, you lose and he wins. This creates a situation where elected officials want to “win” the vote as much, or more, than they want to “win” the debate.
WASHINGTON — Congressional Republicans are so anti-tax, surely they will fight to prevent a payroll-tax increase on virtually every wage earner starting Jan. 1, right?
Apparently not.
They’re saying a tax cut should end as planned, opposing President Obama, who wants to extend it. The policy helps the 46 percent of all Americans who owe no federal income taxes but who pay a “payroll tax” on practically every dime they earn.
Huh?
Surly they can explain themselves?
Tax reductions, “no matter how well-intended,” will push the deficit higher, making the panel’s task that much harder, Camp’s office said.
Nope. They can’t.
I may give this whole thing up and just go watch some baseball.
WASHINGTON (AP) – Republican presidential hopeful Jon Huntsman says he’d be open to running as vice president if rival and tea party favorite Michele Bachmann wins the nomination.
The former ambassador to China and ex-Utah governor says that every time he’s been asked to serve his country he’s answered “yes.” Huntsman tells CNN interviewer Piers Morgan that if asked by the Minnesota congresswoman to run as her vice president he’d “be the first person to sign up, absolutely.”
I wanna see how they spin the fact that he’s smart enough to call out the Republicans but yet can’t wait to serve as their new Arch-Enemy.
“This is a tough game. You can’t be intimidated. You can’t be frightened. And as far as I’m concerned — the tea party can go straight to hell,” Waters said, according to Los Angeles television station KABC.
The gentle gentle Left. So offended at language and words.
If you go listen to the video she even offers to help the Tea Party get to hell. How sweet.
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Monday shows that 20% of the nation’s voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as president. Forty-four percent (44%) Strongly Disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -24.
That matches the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for President Obama, a level previously reached just once last September.
I’m surprised that the junior level administrator made it this long.
