Because most Americans do not understand how our government even works, should their be a mandate...

[Ray From Cleveland]

...to educate them?


When you get down to brass tacks, there is A LOT to learn about the way the federal government operates. The procedure in congress, for instance, when it comes to legislation is very complex. Do you really think most American voters understand it?

I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge of how the three branches of government operate is limited to an outline of sorts. It's actually very complex and more nuanced than people think it is. It takes years of education in public policy to even understand it all.

Think of it this way: maybe in school growing up you watched the "Schoolhouse Rock!" episode of how a bill is advanced and you got a very basic spiel about the Checks and Balances system through a fun song. Now does that mean you understand the totality of ANY the concepts offered in that cartoon? NO! Someone in the 6th grade more than likely doesn't care about researching the topic further.

I cant remember the exact percentage, but the last poll I read on the subject said that a majority of American adults cannot even name all 3 branches of government let alone have a basic understanding of how they operate among each other!

In other words, how to we fix this problem? I mean seriously think about this: when someone turns 18, the government decides that that person understands how the federal and state government operates and therefore has the right to vote. THAT IS COMPLETELY INSANE BECAUSE OUR PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM IS A JOKE - ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO CIVICS. We might as well allow 6th graders the right to vote because they heard the song about how a bill is passed.

The problem is in order to understand politics, you have to be interested in it like anything else. Trying to teach somebody about something they could care less about is not going to solve the problem.

It takes a lot of time to actually understand what's going on; time people won't dedicate or perhaps time people don't have.

For me, I wake up to talk radio on my alarm clock, from there, I get ready for work and get on this internet to discuss politics most times. I get in my car and drive to work with politics talk on. I get to work and get in my truck and listen to talk shows all day. After work, I go back home listening to politics, get dinner ready and spend another few hours here or reading the news.

Most people don't have my kind of day. If they listen to the radio, it's music. When they turn on their television, it's entertainment. When they get on the internet, it's a variety of things.

I'm not much of a sports fan or movie watcher. Politics just happens to be my thing. Now I don't care if people are not interested in politics like I am, I care that those people vote which we shouldn't allow in this country. I think before you vote, you should have to take a short and simple test to see if you have even the slightest knowledge about politics and policies. I think Republicans would be all for it, but Democrats would scream bloody murder because they depend on the politically ignorant. It's why all your lower income inner cities vote Democrat.

I firmly believe that some bum living under an overpass has as much a right to vote as a CEO. He still should decide who best represents his interests

If the bum doesn't understand what he's voting on, why should he be voting in the first place? He doesn't understand enough to know what his best interests are other than voting for politicians that promise to take other people's money and give it to him.

Just because the homeless person would vote for his immediate interests doesn't mean that he doesn't understand anything.

If they were able to understand anything, they wouldn't be homeless.

 

[Rustic]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

Most progressive snowflakes have no idea… Fact

Most Trump voters have no idea....FACT

You do realize the reason why Trump is sitting in the oval office is because the alternative was the Hildabeast....

 

[rightwinger]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

 

[rightwinger]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

Most progressive snowflakes have no idea… Fact

Most Trump voters have no idea....FACT

You do realize the reason why Trump is sitting in the oval office is because the alternative was the Hildabeast....

Most voters chose otherwise

Only low information voters chose Trump

 

[Rustic]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Teaching a person to fish is far more valuable than giving someone fish… progressive snowflakes like yourself Have never realized that

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

...to educate them?


When you get down to brass tacks, there is A LOT to learn about the way the federal government operates. The procedure in congress, for instance, when it comes to legislation is very complex. Do you really think most American voters understand it?

I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge of how the three branches of government operate is limited to an outline of sorts. It's actually very complex and more nuanced than people think it is. It takes years of education in public policy to even understand it all.

Think of it this way: maybe in school growing up you watched the "Schoolhouse Rock!" episode of how a bill is advanced and you got a very basic spiel about the Checks and Balances system through a fun song. Now does that mean you understand the totality of ANY the concepts offered in that cartoon? NO! Someone in the 6th grade more than likely doesn't care about researching the topic further.

I cant remember the exact percentage, but the last poll I read on the subject said that a majority of American adults cannot even name all 3 branches of government let alone have a basic understanding of how they operate among each other!

In other words, how to we fix this problem? I mean seriously think about this: when someone turns 18, the government decides that that person understands how the federal and state government operates and therefore has the right to vote. THAT IS COMPLETELY INSANE BECAUSE OUR PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM IS A JOKE - ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO CIVICS. We might as well allow 6th graders the right to vote because they heard the song about how a bill is passed.

The problem is in order to understand politics, you have to be interested in it like anything else. Trying to teach somebody about something they could care less about is not going to solve the problem.

It takes a lot of time to actually understand what's going on; time people won't dedicate or perhaps time people don't have.

For me, I wake up to talk radio on my alarm clock, from there, I get ready for work and get on this internet to discuss politics most times. I get in my car and drive to work with politics talk on. I get to work and get in my truck and listen to talk shows all day. After work, I go back home listening to politics, get dinner ready and spend another few hours here or reading the news.

Most people don't have my kind of day. If they listen to the radio, it's music. When they turn on their television, it's entertainment. When they get on the internet, it's a variety of things.

I'm not much of a sports fan or movie watcher. Politics just happens to be my thing. Now I don't care if people are not interested in politics like I am, I care that those people vote which we shouldn't allow in this country. I think before you vote, you should have to take a short and simple test to see if you have even the slightest knowledge about politics and policies. I think Republicans would be all for it, but Democrats would scream bloody murder because they depend on the politically ignorant. It's why all your lower income inner cities vote Democrat.

I firmly believe that some bum living under an overpass has as much a right to vote as a CEO. He still should decide who best represents his interests

If the bum doesn't understand what he's voting on, why should he be voting in the first place? He doesn't understand enough to know what his best interests are other than voting for politicians that promise to take other people's money and give it to him.

The bum will vote for the candidate who will do the most to get him from underneath that bridge

The CEO will vote for the candidate who will help him get the next bridge contract

Same thing

In other words, the bum will vote for the candidate that promises to steal money from the productive to get him from under that bridge instead of him getting out from under that bridge himself.

 

[Crixus]

I firmly believe that some bum living under an overpass has as much a right to vote as a CEO. He still should decide who best represents his interests

If the bum doesn't understand what he's voting on, why should he be voting in the first place? He doesn't understand enough to know what his best interests are other than voting for politicians that promise to take other people's money and give it to him.

Just because the homeless person would vote for his immediate interests doesn't mean that he doesn't understand anything.

A better and more to-the-point analysis might be:

"You don't sell products, benefits or solutions --- you sell FEELINGS"

That's exactly what we got sold. The "feeling" of a wall that somebody else pays for, the "feeling" of "they're laughing at us"; the "feeling" of "America great"; the "feeling" of "political establishment"; the "feeling" of "the press is the enemy", the "feeling" of "bomb the shit out of ISIS"; the "feeling" of "greatest jobs president god ever created; the "feeling" of "knock the hell"; the "feeling" of mocking the disabled (that one didn't sell so well); the "feeling" of mocking veterans (ditto); and the "feeling" of "Duh EEBIL Muslims" and "Duh EEBIL rapist Mexicans, and I don't care what the Constitution says".

It's the truest observation Donald Rump ever came up with. In effect another version of:

"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public".

This is the price of the Cult of Ignorance. As "the wages of sin is death", so the wages of ignorance is a con artist conning his way into high office because the unwashed are too simplistic to see right through the game.

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge." -- Isaac Asimov, 1980​

The feeling that peace resigns supreme. So a presidant gets a Nobel peace prize, Then expands a war and starts a couple more.


Or saying the earth will cool back down and the oceans will stop rising.


Yeah, don't know where Drumphf got that shit.....

Well that was coherent wasn't it.


(^^^SATIRE^^^)

There is vedio of all of it coming out of Half Black Jesus's mouth. And the Sharpton thing, I mean the dude is a clown. Hillary barely even spoke to the alleged black pope. There was that thing of him peeing 2.6 million in back tax's. Polititions no longer have to kiss this fools ring. He can't do anything anymore.

 

[Rustic]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

Most progressive snowflakes have no idea… Fact

Most Trump voters have no idea....FACT

You do realize the reason why Trump is sitting in the oval office is because the alternative was the Hildabeast....

Most voters chose otherwise

Only low information voters chose Trump

Na, The electoral college worked perfectly at keeping the crazies at bay.
Apparently progressive snowflakes like yourself did not realize What the rules where going into the election.

Thankfully this is not a shit eating democracy…

 

[rightwinger]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Teaching a person to fish is far more valuable than giving someone fish… progressive snowflakes like yourself Have never realized that

That is a valuable parable

But what happens when there are no longer any fish in the pond?
That is why you need government

 

[Pogo]

...to educate them?


When you get down to brass tacks, there is A LOT to learn about the way the federal government operates. The procedure in congress, for instance, when it comes to legislation is very complex. Do you really think most American voters understand it?

I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge of how the three branches of government operate is limited to an outline of sorts. It's actually very complex and more nuanced than people think it is. It takes years of education in public policy to even understand it all.

Think of it this way: maybe in school growing up you watched the "Schoolhouse Rock!" episode of how a bill is advanced and you got a very basic spiel about the Checks and Balances system through a fun song. Now does that mean you understand the totality of ANY the concepts offered in that cartoon? NO! Someone in the 6th grade more than likely doesn't care about researching the topic further.

I cant remember the exact percentage, but the last poll I read on the subject said that a majority of American adults cannot even name all 3 branches of government let alone have a basic understanding of how they operate among each other!

In other words, how to we fix this problem? I mean seriously think about this: when someone turns 18, the government decides that that person understands how the federal and state government operates and therefore has the right to vote. THAT IS COMPLETELY INSANE BECAUSE OUR PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM IS A JOKE - ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO CIVICS. We might as well allow 6th graders the right to vote because they heard the song about how a bill is passed.

/----/ The purpose of schooling used to be to teach us how to think and learn on our own. If an adult is too lazy to read about civics then it's their problem. But I agree the lack of knowledge is appalling

Fully agree with the first sentence, but on the second, that becomes by definition everybody's problem -- as has been amply cited here already. I think the ideal of education (I'll resist the term schooling as too institutional and thus part of the problem) is to generate curiosity as opposed to wilful ignorance.

Obviously that's not happening. Part of the hangup is that institutionalized school-factory mentality, and the other part is a powerful force of mass LCD media that's been also alluded to in another post, to wit:

Hey, wow, whose shoes are Kim Kardashian wearing in that Instagram photo?

That's exactly why I rail against TV. It produces a stupid populace.

And to tie these two together --- we've been electing people (read: buying electoral products) based on TV for 40 years -- and now we're stuck with one not only sold by TV but created by it.

 

[Rustic]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Teaching a person to fish is far more valuable than giving someone fish… progressive snowflakes like yourself Have never realized that

That is a valuable parable

But what happens when there are no longer any fish in the pond?
That is why you need government

Society is supposed to be a temporary helping hand... that's why we do not need socialism. It's a fucking money pit of waste

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Everybody having a vehicle to get to work every morning benefits society, so should our government buy everybody an automobile? Having a nice front yard benefits society, so should our federal government provide free lawn care services for every home owner?

We don't have free high school, we have schools that are paid for (by force) by the taxpayers.

So I go to work every day, create tax money, pay that money for some kid to go to college to be a doctor. Then when I need a doctor, I go to that kid who's education I financed and he charges me $200.00 for the visit. That's fair?

 

[Pogo]

Everybody having a vehicle to get to work every morning benefits society, so should our government buy everybody an automobile? Having a nice front yard benefits society, so should our federal government provide free lawn care services for every home owner?

Neither of those "benefits society". The former at most benefits an individual, but so does a public transit system or a cooperative car pool.

This culture has a very weird hangup on the "individualism" thing.

Actually I like your idea here --

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

--- except I don't think such a test should be "very" simple. It might even require knowing the differece between "less" and "fewer".

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Neither of those "benefits society". The former at most benefits an individual, but so does a public transit system or a cooperative car pool.

This culture has a very weird hangup on the "individualism" thing.

Actually I like your idea here --

Sure it does. People being able to go to work benefits society because they create tax revenue. Not everybody can car pool or take public transportation either because of the distance, routes, or not having set working hours. Having a beautiful yard keeps property values up. The higher the property value, the higher the taxation for the city, and the more money they can use for their schools.

College on the other hand is an investment. An investment is when you risk your own money, hopefully to get that money back plus a profit. College graduates make more money than non-college graduates on average. It only makes sense for them to use their own money for their own investment just like we all do with our investments.

If government is going to fund investments for people, then let them buy me some Walmart or Google stock. I'm fine with that because at least that would be fair.

 

[rightwinger]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Everybody having a vehicle to get to work every morning benefits society, so should our government buy everybody an automobile? Having a nice front yard benefits society, so should our federal government provide free lawn care services for every home owner?

We don't have free high school, we have schools that are paid for (by force) by the taxpayers.

So I go to work every day, create tax money, pay that money for some kid to go to college to be a doctor. Then when I need a doctor, I go to that kid who's education I financed and he charges me $200.00 for the visit. That's fair?

I kind of agree with you....why not?

If the government can do it cheaper and there is less money for me out of pocket......let's go for it

Government benefits from large scale. If the Government can put out a contract for one million cars.....they will get a very good price per car

Why not provide them to the public at substantial discount?

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Everybody having a vehicle to get to work every morning benefits society, so should our government buy everybody an automobile? Having a nice front yard benefits society, so should our federal government provide free lawn care services for every home owner?

We don't have free high school, we have schools that are paid for (by force) by the taxpayers.

So I go to work every day, create tax money, pay that money for some kid to go to college to be a doctor. Then when I need a doctor, I go to that kid who's education I financed and he charges me $200.00 for the visit. That's fair?

I kind of agree with you....why not?

If the government can do it cheaper and there is less money for me out of pocket......let's go for it

Government benefits from large scale. If the Government can put out a contract for one million cars.....they will get a very good price per car

Why not provide them to the public at substantial discount?

And do what, have everybody working for the government?

We live in a capitalist society. If taxpayers were to fund education so we could get huge discounts from their services once they start working, then we no longer have a capitalist society, we then would have a socialist society because wages would be set by the government instead of the individual.

College costs are supply and demand just like the workforce. Too much supply, and the price goes down. Too much demand, and the price increases. So what do you think would happen if we injected all these people into colleges that are already maxed out?

Back in the 70's, not many of our class went to college; probably less than a third and Lord knows how many of them actually graduated. Today, nearly everybody must go to college to earn decent living.

 

[rightwinger]

If a voter does not know there are 100 Senators, 435 Congressmen and 9 Supreme Court Justices......what difference does it make?

It doesn't, but that doesn't mean they know the issues and what's at stake.

For instance, Hil-Liar was yapping about free college. The political ignorant think that government will somehow make college free. They don't understand the fact that somebody would have had to pay for that college. They don't understand that 20 trillion in debt is a dangerous level of debt for this country to have. They don't understand that if you tax the rich for it, some will take their companies and move out the country to escape taxes. Let me put it this way...........

Let's say that the baseball league had fans vote on players instead of the teams choosing who they needed. Your city allowed any citizen to choose the player, and my city only allowed those with a great knowledge of baseball to choose the players for our team. Which city do you think would have a better baseball team?

That's why I said if it were up to me, every voter would have to take a very simple test before being allowed to vote. If we did that, we might end up with less voters like this:

Our society benefits from having free High School
We are deciding whether free college is the next step

An educated workforce benefits society

Everybody having a vehicle to get to work every morning benefits society, so should our government buy everybody an automobile? Having a nice front yard benefits society, so should our federal government provide free lawn care services for every home owner?

We don't have free high school, we have schools that are paid for (by force) by the taxpayers.

So I go to work every day, create tax money, pay that money for some kid to go to college to be a doctor. Then when I need a doctor, I go to that kid who's education I financed and he charges me $200.00 for the visit. That's fair?

I kind of agree with you....why not?

If the government can do it cheaper and there is less money for me out of pocket......let's go for it

Government benefits from large scale. If the Government can put out a contract for one million cars.....they will get a very good price per car

Why not provide them to the public at substantial discount?

And do what, have everybody working for the government?

We live in a capitalist society. If taxpayers were to fund education so we could get huge discounts from their services once they start working, then we no longer have a capitalist society, we then would have a socialist society because wages would be set by the government instead of the individual.

College costs are supply and demand just like the workforce. Too much supply, and the price goes down. Too much demand, and the price increases. So what do you think would happen if we injected all these people into colleges that are already maxed out?

Back in the 70's, not many of our class went to college; probably less than a third and Lord knows how many of them actually graduated. Today, nearly everybody must go to college to earn decent living.

We provide the educated workforce our society needs
Used to be eighth grade was enough
Then High School
Looks like College is probably required in a technological society

I would like to see the Government develop basic online college courses and offer them to the public for free

 

[Pogo]

Sure it does. People being able to go to work benefits society because they create tax revenue. Not everybody can car pool or take public transportation either because of the distance, routes, or not having set working hours.

Ah but what you said was that everybody --- literally, everybody --- should have their own car when obviously that would (a) choke the roads and (b) is not universally necessary anyway.

This is one of the benefifts of living in a city and the reason they exist --- concentration of resources. And it's one of the necessary evils of living in the sticks. Without a car here I'd be fucked. That wasn't always true of course before cars existed, but it's the product of how we're set up. But in a city I wouldn't need that stone around my neck and it would be a detriment to society as well as a drag on myself.

Having a beautiful yard keeps property values up.

Pfft. Abstract concept. Properties are not sold on "beautiful yard". They're sold on structure and location. All "beautiful yard" does is catch the eye initially. And again all that benefits is the seller. The property gets taxed whether that seller unloads it or not.

College on the other hand is an investment. An investment is when you risk your own money, hopefully to get that money back plus a profit.

And as such it's priced out of the range of way too many. Again, because of how we're set up, there's capitalism again. It kept me and my siblings out, so nah I really don't wanna hear more abstract theory that doesn't fly in the real world.

If government is going to fund investments for people, then let them buy me some Walmart or Google stock.

Ah so you want the government running industry. Didn't another country try that? Germany was it?

 

[Pogo]

If the bum doesn't understand what he's voting on, why should he be voting in the first place? He doesn't understand enough to know what his best interests are other than voting for politicians that promise to take other people's money and give it to him.

Just because the homeless person would vote for his immediate interests doesn't mean that he doesn't understand anything.

A better and more to-the-point analysis might be:

"You don't sell products, benefits or solutions --- you sell FEELINGS"

That's exactly what we got sold. The "feeling" of a wall that somebody else pays for, the "feeling" of "they're laughing at us"; the "feeling" of "America great"; the "feeling" of "political establishment"; the "feeling" of "the press is the enemy", the "feeling" of "bomb the shit out of ISIS"; the "feeling" of "greatest jobs president god ever created; the "feeling" of "knock the hell"; the "feeling" of mocking the disabled (that one didn't sell so well); the "feeling" of mocking veterans (ditto); and the "feeling" of "Duh EEBIL Muslims" and "Duh EEBIL rapist Mexicans, and I don't care what the Constitution says".

It's the truest observation Donald Rump ever came up with. In effect another version of:

"Nobody ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public".

This is the price of the Cult of Ignorance. As "the wages of sin is death", so the wages of ignorance is a con artist conning his way into high office because the unwashed are too simplistic to see right through the game.

There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge." -- Isaac Asimov, 1980​

The feeling that peace resigns supreme. So a presidant gets a Nobel peace prize, Then expands a war and starts a couple more.


Or saying the earth will cool back down and the oceans will stop rising.


Yeah, don't know where Drumphf got that shit.....

Well that was coherent wasn't it.


(^^^SATIRE^^^)

There is vedio of all of it coming out of Half Black Jesus's mouth. And the Sharpton thing, I mean the dude is a clown. Hillary barely even spoke to the alleged black pope. There was that thing of him peeing 2.6 million in back tax's. Polititions no longer have to kiss this fools ring. He can't do anything anymore.

That's what I mean by "coherent" since I posted nothing about a "half black jesus", a "Sharpton", a "Hillary", a "black pope" or "peeing". Perhaps you might want to ease off snorting Thorazine.

 

[Picaro]

...to educate them?


When you get down to brass tacks, there is A LOT to learn about the way the federal government operates. The procedure in congress, for instance, when it comes to legislation is very complex. Do you really think most American voters understand it?

I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge of how the three branches of government operate is limited to an outline of sorts. It's actually very complex and more nuanced than people think it is. It takes years of education in public policy to even understand it all.

Think of it this way: maybe in school growing up you watched the "Schoolhouse Rock!" episode of how a bill is advanced and you got a very basic spiel about the Checks and Balances system through a fun song. Now does that mean you understand the totality of ANY the concepts offered in that cartoon? NO! Someone in the 6th grade more than likely doesn't care about researching the topic further.

I cant remember the exact percentage, but the last poll I read on the subject said that a majority of American adults cannot even name all 3 branches of government let alone have a basic understanding of how they operate among each other!

In other words, how to we fix this problem? I mean seriously think about this: when someone turns 18, the government decides that that person understands how the federal and state government operates and therefore has the right to vote. THAT IS COMPLETELY INSANE BECAUSE OUR PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM IS A JOKE - ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO CIVICS. We might as well allow 6th graders the right to vote because they heard the song about how a bill is passed.

Requiring a civics test on your local, state, and federal govt., in English, would be desirable, certainly; you can vote in any or all them according to the tests you pass, can't vote in those you fail. If you can't pass any of those tests allowing you to vote is just ridiculous. We all know why that won't happen, though.