Re: OT Republicans

"El Guapo" <plethora@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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"Smithee" <ssmith2010@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
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On Mar 28, 11:07 am, Natalie Teeger <replyonuse...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
"Republicans believe in the free market
for profit but want to socialize losses."

-------------Bill Maher on the bail out
of bear stearns.

Joe Kennedy put it well in an atricle he wrote:

Our own country (is) a system of socialism for the rich and free
enterprise for the poor.

Banks make billions on the gap between federal lending rates and what
they charge consumers to borrow for homes, cars, small businesses, and
personal needs. The government guarantees their deposits, so that if
the banks fail, the taxpayer is left holding the bag.

It didn't used to be that way. There didn't used to be guarantees.
There's a good reason there are now. Oh, and those guarantees? They're
not such a big help to rich people and companies. They have most of their
money in non-guaranteed investments, which give you much better returns
for the higher risk. (See how that works?)

Meanwhile, they still make money from the guarantees. No matter how you
slice it, the government still subsidizes big business, and none of it is
rooted in capitalism. Yet republicans (presumably, like yourself) love this
stuff. They don't favor free market capitalism. They favor corporatism and
the process of government massaging the economy to suit their whims --
almost the very definition of socialism. They serve failing industries free
money (eg. agriculture). They prop up entire industries (eg. pharm,
entertainment, etc) with the socialist idea of intellectual property. And
the latest issue they're spearheading is the idea of keeping mexicans out of
the country because they're stealing "our" jobs -- what's this "our"
bull*** anyway? Central planning at its finest.

The notion that republicans favor small government, low spending, or the
free market is one of the greatest fictions in politics. Their brand of
socialism differs from the democrats' only in the minor details.
Conservatism is dead.


Insurance companies charge consumers with premiums that go up and up,
yet expect the government to cover their losses when they get hit --
as we saw in the wake of the Hurricane Katrina disaster.

The government covered the insurance company losses from Katrina? That's
news to me. Got a link to prove it?

Student loan corporations, working closely with colleges and
universities, contribute to spiraling higher-education costs with
loans guaranteed by the government. Conservatives are fine with
socializing the risks of capitalism, so long as they can privatize the
profits. As for the poor? They're decidedly on their own.

I'm sure this is hard for a Kennedy to understand, but most poor people
don't have money lying around to use for college expenses. The only way a
poor person can attend a major college is with a full grant or scholarship
(which are scarce!) or with a loan. They often need loans even if they
attend a relatively inexpensive college. He obviously fails to realize
that the whole point of guaranteeing the loans in the first place is to
allow poor people to qualify for them, because otherwise, they wouldn't.

Yeah, I know the story. Without the government, the poor would just be lost
sheep with no one to care for them.

It's in a university's best interest to admit the poor. Not only does it
serve as a great PR move (note Harvard's and Stanford's recent policy
regarding waiving the tuition of the poor...), but it also can give the
university the best mixture of diversity and talent. Let's face it -- lots
of colleges want smart talented students, so it makes sense for them to
provide scholarships for many kids who can't afford to go. If they didn't,
they'd be narrowing their crop and expanding a cheaper university's talent
pool. Thing is, universities often end up making money in the deal, if the
university is any good. These kids are often funneled into sports (good for
the university) or working in their respective fields in laboratories or as
teaching assistants. This brings grant money into the university, let alone
the prestige of having accomplished investigators who are publishing and
presenting work at conferences. Guess who tends to present that work? You
got it. The students.

Let's also keep in mind that college has become the de facto avenue for
becoming successful in certain fields. You know, the fields that our
society labels "academic". This is a consequence of how the government
funds education, even at earlier levels. Not only that, but licensure often
depends on it. The government has created the great monster called college
and its associated costs that it wants to slay. There's no logical reason
for college to be the only source of learning or advancement without an
external hand at work. And yes, like it or not, it's become a subsidy for
corporations who don't have to put in nearly as much work in the hiring
process when they can base a significant chunk of their hiring procedure on
licenses and degrees.


Besides, people who take loans to go to college still want to pay as
little as possible, because eventually they have to pay it back. Loan or
not, they would still like for college to be as inexpensive as possible.
They will take cost into consideration when choosing a college. There are
a lot of things driving up college costs, but I doubt that's one of them.

Why wouldn't it be? Give a consumer base a pocket full of money and watch
what happens to prices.


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