Election 2006

[reverend_kyle]

It would be refreshing to see Democrats actually take a STAND on something and stick by it on principle. Naaahhhh - will never happen. The Democrats party platform is "We're not Bush." They have no principles and no ideas. Lucky for them, neither were needed to win this election.

Bullshit, maybe if you stopped listening to faux news you'd hear that the democrats have plan and they've already announced it..


Wait actually I think I saw that on fox news... maybe you should just pull your head out of your ass.

Ah, Reverend, Reverend, Reverend. Hasn't anyone ever told you it's best to keep your mouth shut and have people THINK you stupid rather than open it and thus remove all doubt? Your ignorance truly knows no bounds.

As the primary Democratic Party apologist here on this board, why don't YOU enlighten me and other inquiring minds as to what, exactly, is the Democratic Party platform? Simply saying "We're not Bush" isn't good enough but it's all that they seem to have.

ARE YOU JOKING ME! we were just discussing it 3 posts ago.. its called literacy.

[andre the giant]

Lets say mimimum wage is $5.00 /hr. It is increased to $6.00 /hr. Now the price of goods has to go up to make up for the extra $1.00 /hr. for each employee. So a loaf of bread goes from .99 to $1.07.

I don't think it works that way Jay. Commodities don't become more expensive because the kid in the paper hat is making an extra buck an hour.

It does work that way. How could it NOT work that way?

The company has to spend more money. (a buck an hour, times 20 hours a week for a part timer, times whatever the number of employees is. Eventually you're talking big money.) Whenever a company has to spend more to make or deliver a product, they raise the cost of that product so they can maintain a profit. If the company doesn't profit, it goes out of business and everyone loses their jobby job.

Another reason I hate minimum wage increases??? Take "burger-flipper Bob"... He's probably in high school, has no skills whatsoever, lives at home, and uses his money to pay for essentials like mp3 downloads, PS2 games, and chinese take out. So Bob gets a raise for nothing, he hasn't increased productivity, improved profit, etc. He just gets more money for being the same uneducated worker drone that he was before.

Meanwhile, Andre, who has a Bachelor's degree plus some grad hours, has worked for 13 years at the same company, has educated himself in all the changing trends of electronic media, has contributed to the growth and profit of the company in many ways, has a house, expenses and responsiblilites. Andre's salary doesn't go up at all. Nobody cares about Andre's salary because all you do-gooders out there who want to force companies to give unskilled workers a raise think that Andre is wealthy. HA!

Andre has worked his ass off for 13 years, just to see some booger picking burger flipper get a raise for converting O2 to CO2? Screw that shite! I worked minimum wage jobs when I was a teenager and then when I was in college. I NEVER planned on staying in one of those jobs any longer than it took for me to find a REAL job.

[DogDoc]

ARE YOU JOKING ME! we were just discussing it 3 posts ago.. its called literacy.

That's it, then? Raising the minimum wage? That's the party platform? And vague talk of immigration reform? That's a helluva platform. My mistake. I take it back. It's no wonder, then, that they won the election running on such a solid set of ideas.

[DogDoc]

ARE YOU JOKING ME! we were just discussing it 3 posts ago.. its called literacy.

Oh, and by the way. I'm all for literacy. Let me know how that works out for you.

[jay_a2j]

Lets say mimimum wage is $5.00 /hr. It is increased to $6.00 /hr. Now the price of goods has to go up to make up for the extra $1.00 /hr. for each employee. So a loaf of bread goes from .99 to $1.07.

I don't think it works that way Jay. Commodities don't become more expensive because the kid in the paper hat is making an extra buck an hour.

It does work that way. How could it NOT work that way?

The company has to spend more money. (a buck an hour, times 20 hours a week for a part timer, times whatever the number of employees is. Eventually you're talking big money.) Whenever a company has to spend more to make or deliver a product, they raise the cost of that product so they can maintain a profit. If the company doesn't profit, it goes out of business and everyone loses their jobby job.

Another reason I hate minimum wage increases??? Take "burger-flipper Bob"... He's probably in high school, has no skills whatsoever, lives at home, and uses his money to pay for essentials like mp3 downloads, PS2 games, and chinese take out. So Bob gets a raise for nothing, he hasn't increased productivity, improved profit, etc. He just gets more money for being the same uneducated worker drone that he was before.

Meanwhile, Andre, who has a Bachelor's degree plus some grad hours, has worked for 13 years at the same company, has educated himself in all the changing trends of electronic media, has contributed to the growth and profit of the company in many ways, has a house, expenses and responsiblilites. Andre's salary doesn't go up at all. Nobody cares about Andre's salary because all you do-gooders out there who want to force companies to give unskilled workers a raise think that Andre is wealthy. HA!

Andre has worked his ass off for 13 years, just to see some booger picking burger flipper get a raise for converting O2 to CO2? Screw that shite! I worked minimum wage jobs when I was a teenager and then when I was in college. I NEVER planned on staying in one of those jobs any longer than it took for me to find a REAL job.

Well said andre, and funny too!

[reverend_kyle]

ARE YOU JOKING ME! we were just discussing it 3 posts ago.. its called literacy.

That's it, then? Raising the minimum wage? That's the party platform? And vague talk of immigration reform? That's a helluva platform. My mistake. I take it back. It's no wonder, then, that they won the election running on such a solid set of ideas.

If you read there was alot more to it., however we were discussing what we thought was likely to happen with bush in power.

[jay_a2j]

Another example of a not-so-bright Florida voter.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — An absentee ballot was mailed with what may have been a rare stamp worth as much as $200,000

courtesy of foxnews.

[reverend_kyle]

Another example of a not-so-bright Florida voter.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — An absentee ballot was mailed with what may have been a rare stamp worth as much as $200,000

courtesy of foxnews.

Maybe they justcare about their country $200,000 worth.

[vtmarik]

Another example of a not-so-bright Florida voter.

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — An absentee ballot was mailed with what may have been a rare stamp worth as much as $200,000

courtesy of foxnews.

Maybe, but the ballot was filled out correctly!

[qeee1]

It does work that way. How could it NOT work that way?

The company has to spend more money. (a buck an hour, times 20 hours a week for a part timer, times whatever the number of employees is. Eventually you're talking big money.) Whenever a company has to spend more to make or deliver a product, they raise the cost of that product so they can maintain a profit. If the company doesn't profit, it goes out of business and everyone loses their jobby job.

Most minimum wage paying companies (at least from my experience here) are big corporations with massive profit margins, increasing the wages doesn't mean everyone loses their jobs, it means one less starbucks gets opened this year.

Another reason I hate minimum wage increases??? Take "burger-flipper Bob"... He's probably in high school, has no skills whatsoever, lives at home, and uses his money to pay for essentials like mp3 downloads, PS2 games, and chinese take out. So Bob gets a raise for nothing, he hasn't increased productivity, improved profit, etc. He just gets more money for being the same uneducated worker drone that he was before.

Given the profit a typical worker generates he was underpaid before and he's still underpaid now... ok.

Where I work makes about 7,000 profit a day, workers get paid around 2,000 max...

Meanwhile, Andre, who has a Bachelor's degree plus some grad hours, has worked for 13 years at the same company, has educated himself in all the changing trends of electronic media, has contributed to the growth and profit of the company in many ways, has a house, expenses and responsiblilites. Andre's salary doesn't go up at all. Nobody cares about Andre's salary because all you do-gooders out there who want to force companies to give unskilled workers a raise think that Andre is wealthy. HA!

Andre has worked his ass off for 13 years, just to see some booger picking burger flipper get a raise for converting O2 to CO2? Screw that shite! I worked minimum wage jobs when I was a teenager and then when I was in college. I NEVER planned on staying in one of those jobs any longer than it took for me to find a REAL job.

Andre is also being screwed over apparently, his fault for staying with a shitty company so long. And burger flipping is hardly a pleasent job to work, bob deserves to be paid decently.

Also in case you haven't noticed, jobs people previously used to support families are moving to China and all that's replaced them often is minimum wage jobs.

[subdork]

Most minimum wage paying companies (at least from my experience here) are big corporations with massive profit margins, increasing the wages doesn't mean everyone loses their jobs, it means one less starbucks gets opened this year.

Most minimum wage jobs are in small businesses. Most fast food chains and whatnot are independently owned and operated. In other words, what typically happens is this:
some burger flipper manages to go to night school, get promoted to manager, saves up some money, then pays the $500 franchising fee to open up his own store. At least that's the way it was with the guy that I worked for. Now, he drove us like indentured servants (if you didn't have anything to do, your shift was over... don't matter if you were scheduled to work from 11-4, if it wasn't busy at 2:30, time to clock out) Why did he work us so hard and try to save his pennies at every turn? Because opening up a store is expensive... the land, the construction, etc.

Given the profit a typical worker generates he was underpaid before and he's still underpaid now... ok.

Where I work makes about 7,000 profit a day, workers get paid around 2,000 max...

There's very little profit and lots of risk in opening up your own small business. At first at least; once you've paid off all the initial costs, it does get nicely profitable.

Andre is also being screwed over apparently, his fault for staying with a shitty company so long. And burger flipping is hardly a pleasent job to work, bob deserves to be paid decently.

Also in case you haven't noticed, jobs people previously used to support families are moving to China and all that's replaced them often is minimum wage jobs.

I deserved every penny I earned. Probably not any more
I only had one co-worker who was not a teenager. He was in his late 20s and raising a family. He got promoted to assistant manager. There he made more than enough money to live well in a place like TN where the cost of living and tax rates are very very low.

Which brings me to my view of the minimum wage:

It costs twice as much to live in a place like NYC than it does to live in a place like Athens, GA. Why on earth would you set the minimum wage at the federal level?

For example, according to bankrate.com, $16,000 in Queens, NY (8$/hr x 40hrs per week x 50 weeks per year) is equivalent to $9,504.58 in Paducah, KY. (which would be $4.75 under that same working conditions)

Raising the minimum wage in places like NY and California makes sense. Raising the minimum wage in KY or IA doesn't.

[Backglass]

It costs twice as much to live in a place like NYC than it does to live in a place like Athens, GA. Why on earth would you set the minimum wage at the federal level?

I can attest to that having lived in 8 different states. Housing prices as well. The house I own now was 3X the price of our friends in Georgia (Atlanta Suburb) and they're house is a frickin' mansion with a few acres to boot.

[cowshrptrn]

With the current state of big business and their agressiveness and compelte disregard for anyone except themselves, i'm not sure smaller government is the right way to go. We need a large RESPONSIBLE government (i know, i'm starting to sound liek an idealist...) which woudl rein in corporations, and not be afraid to ruffle some feathers to cut down on greenhouse emissions, and provide free healthcare to everyone (yes that woudl require taxes, but we'd save money overall since we would give it to the gov. who don't add a lot to our costs to increase profits)

Progressives, while they need to be revived a bit, can defiantely fix up our country. Now i'm not saying we go over the top with excessive manatory vacation like Germany and end up backpedaling with a troubled economy, but we defiantely can reach a middle ground between socialist and capitalist systems. Right now we're defiantely too far to the capitalist sepctrum.

I would much rather be too far on the capitalism side than socialism. Larger govenment? Isn't it freakin' big enough for you now??? Free healthcare for everyone? Where in our Constitution does it say that??. And name ONE business that the government runs more efficiently than the private sector. Why do you feel that corporations need to be "reined in" in the first place? Why don't you just advocate out-and-out communism and have the state control everything?? Would that work for you, Ivan?

I have a bunch of industries, the TVA which was founded by FDR during the great depression is still pumping out a lot of cheap energy to a LTO of people. Any the government in the US is TINY comapred to government in most other countries.

A great case of a government industry that really did its job was public broadcasting, it provided well rounded opinions, but Rupert Murdoch decided he wnated MORE money, and used his influence to get rid of laws that woudl prevent him from owning all forms of information to areas of the united states, allowing him to buy up newspapers, television stations, and radio stations which caused the right wing disater we now know as Fox News.

One more example to put a final nail in the coffin: Prisons, Now that private companies are taking over prisons they cut costs any way they can so they can pocket a few extra bucks. Living conditions ahve gotten worse in prisons, they are even further from being a place where prisoners can reenter society as a productive member.

About free health care: The uNited States has THE HIGHEST infant mortality rate in the industrialized world. I did a quick comparison of countries with UNiversal Health Care combined with coutnries that have a better infant mortality rate than us: 22 out of 28 countries which have Universal Healthcare have a better infant mortality rate than us. That includes poor countries like Greece and communist countries like Cuba. If you are against universla healthcare, you're against live births (for anyone who wants ot call me a hypocrite for also being pro-choice: I find it unfortunate if the mother INTENDS to ahve the baby, and can healthily have it and is born dead, unlike flushing out of the body a clump of cells that are about as conscious as a tree)

You know corporations are out of control when they dump piles of toxic waste into rivers since its cheaper to pay the fines for it than to dispose of the material in an evironmentally safe manner, when they drive local farmers out of business by using government subsidies to undercut their prices, when they infiltrate the government of developing countries and make it illegal to collect rainwater so the locals are forced to buy water from the foreign investor's company. Thats why we need to reign in companies.

We have already erred WAAY too far on the side of capitalism, i'm not suggesting we go communist, or even as socialist as countreis like Italy and France, becasue i feel that they are so socialist they're impeding the economic growth of their country. I feel there IS a middle ground that we need to reach if we want to stay ahead of the game when we have superpowers liek China and India who, unlike the USSR, have a system that works and is adaptable enough that we wil have to live with them, instead of waiting for them to collapse on themselves.