News Us politics - read first post before comment

[EveHarrington]

I was never a fan of Dubya but at least he’s being vocal about the Russia/election crap and isn’t bowing down like most republicans.

 

[Milo's papa]

Eve, good luck trying to change this topic. Too many people thinking with their emotions and bit their heads.

 

[Justmehere]

Speaking of parades, this is pretty funny: https://pjmedia.com/video/derp-time-sen-chuck-schumer-called-grand-ticker-tape-military-parade
The democrats and republicans trade places too often.

 

[Anarchy]

The democrats and republicans trade places too often.

Since the takeover of the Democratic Party by William Jenkins Bryan and his ultra pietist followers in 1896, the two parties have been interchangeable empty shells, for whatever crap their big backers wanted to put in them.

From that point on, the Democratic Party ceased to be the party of small government, personal freedom and individual choice. Oh, and sound moneyou too, with all of the silver mining, mountain state pietist that piled in with Jennings.

Jenkins

WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN
Damn that autoincorrect.

 

[Anarchy]

@leehalf
Are you aware of the distinction between
Mala in se - things that are wrong in themselves

And

Mala prohibita - things that are only wrong because someone says they're wrong, and threatens to do nasty things to people who do them.

Which of those do you think covers people who cross and imaginary line drawn on a map?

Also, what does the imaginary line on the map represent?

All it is, is where one violent gang's turf ends and a different violent gang's begins

It's the line marking which gang gets to rob, bully and screw over the peaceful, productive people.

 

[Deleted member 487]

Illegal immigrants do jobs that most of us don't do, like back-breaking work harvesting food. They are, in fact, not a drain on our economy, but keep it going.

Exactly! Luis Bracamontes is a perfect example!

I remember too well when I was much better shape than I am now and being turned away from doing the same work on farms that I had been raised doing, because the illegal aliens did the same work for cheaper.

And, by the way, if you are not an American Indian, you come from immigrants, some legal, some not.

The law is the law. If they cannot respect and obey the immigration laws then by what reason can we expect them to respect and obey far simpler jobs? Can we?

My ancestors were brought here as indentured servants. Forced to come here, about the early 1600's, originally. The offer has been made, "if we gave you a free one way ticket back to your home country, would you go?", and every time I said "you bet!" No one to date has ever honored that, however. My home country IS America, my blood has been here for over 398 years. Bad news- the longevity of my blood being here actually makes me native. But my original home country would have been Scotland.

Times have changed and laws have changed.

 

[Deleted member 541]

Is anyone else worried because Rachael Brand has now stepped down???? I can see the writing on the wall and the text isn’t pretty. I fear that Rosenstein will be fired as will Mueller.

 

[Anarchy]

Stroke of a pen. Law of the land. Kinda cool.

That was Clinton aide, Paul Begala, referring to executive orders. Reported in NY Times, July fifth 1998.

Even without going into refuting the legitimacy of the entire statist project*, why does anyone accept statute / fiat law?

Those behind it have no respect for it, so why should anyone else?

There are "laws" of human interaction, and they are there to be seen in all societies. Thomas Jefferson noted that the hunting tribes that he had spent a lot of time with, had a great deal to offer in the way of civilised codes of conduct, "but were without government".

Through out history, absolute rulers and their fiat laws have ended up by causing misery, catastrophe and chaos, Louis quatorze and his first minister Colbert, are a good example.

Law is discovered in the process of justly resolving disputes that arise. The "law merchant" is a good example of an international legal system which emerged without any king or government. It still forms the basis of international business law. Absence of government does not mean lawlessness.

Just law isn't made by idiot politicians and forced down the throats of people at gunpoint.

Before anyone says "but look at our present prosperity" and implies that fiat law was necessary to achieve that,
I'll head that criticism off. It's a post hoc fallacy.

I'm sure that if a farmyard Cockerell could talk, he'd tell us that it his crowing off the top of a pile of shite, is necessary to make the sun rise each morning.

Without the forceable misallocation of goods and money by politicians, and the waste of their stupid wars, we'd all be far better off.

Incidentally, check out "black horse cavalry" in Wikipedia, and the old NYT article that it links to. It describes a bipartisan group of New York politicians who specialised in bills that attacked businesses and individuals, they then sought bribes to not enact the legislation.

____________
* Lysander Spooner's "no treason, the constitution of no allegiance" presents a devastating demolition of the mystique and legitimacy of the united state constitution. It is out of copyright and there's even a free audio book version available.

Herbert Spencer's essay "The great political superstition" examines the roots of the idea that it is somehow legitimate for a government to order people around.

Both of those are well over 100 years old, and are still entirely relevant to today.

 

[scout86]

I remember too well when I was much better shape than I am now and being turned away from doing the same work on farms that I had been raised doing, because the illegal aliens did the same work for cheaper.

This might be a real thing, but it's more complicated.

Up until he went out of business last fall, I fed calves for a neighborhood dairy farmer a couple days a week. He had a terrible time getting help and a nearly impossible time getting GOOD help. Why? Well, although he was a great guy to work for, he didn't pay very good, for one thing. Why didn't he pay very good? Because his profit margin was pretty small (when it WAS a profit margin) and help was just another expense he needed to minimize to try to stay in business. So there were also no benefits, even for the full time people. Besides that, the hours weren't always the hours people wanted to be at work, and it was actual, physical work. He had a good set up. It's not like people were carrying milk pails, but it still involved getting dirty and ending up smelling like cows. Apparently a lot of people don't like the smell of cows. Most of the last few years, he was short handed. I would guess the same sort of thing applies to the fruit and vegetable farmers.

We have a big meet packing plant in this area. Most of the employees are immigrants. That place actually pays pretty well, for this area, and it has benefits. Why are most of the employees immigrants? I'm going to guess because the hours are long and the work is hard, and there aren't a lot of people who want to work there. I know people who work there. It's not a deal where they like their jobs, it's a situation where this is the best paying job they can find and they have families to support. Something they have in common with the immigrants. (We have an interesting situation developing where the Mexican immigrants are complaining about the Somalis moving in and taking over their jobs. I'll bet there was a time when the Germans complained about the Norwegians too.)

There's a lot of talk around here about "illegal immigrants being a drain on the system". (By "here", I mean where I'm living.) I, frankly, don't see it. First, I'm honestly not sure who's legal & who's not, but all the immigrants I know are working hard, keeping a low profile, and paying their own way. The illegal ones, if they have fake papers, are actually paying money into social security and income taxes that they will never be able to take back out.

Of all the things we could possible pick to worry about in this country, personally, I think this is pretty small potatoes. I think the reason it's being presented as a big deal is to scare people and make them easier to manipulate. One of the best ways to unite people is to present them with a "threat" from "the other". For those of you who read "1984", and remember it, there was always a war going on in the background. What was it's purpose? To unite the people in a common cause, and distract them from the real enemy (the government).

While I'm ranting on this topic, I'm going to call out the Republican Party as the more effect fear monger of the two major parties. They've been doing this dog whistle stuff for a long time and people have been buying it. What happened in the last election was that someone came along who was better at using their set up than they were. They've sown the wind, now we're all reaping the whirlwind.

 

[Anarchy]

^^^ multi like

A fair few Somalia have been going back to Somalia, as there are more and better opportunities there.

There are still problems around Mogadishu, where remnants of the Soviet client regime of Said Barre are still living parasitically, but they aren't getting things their own way now. A telecoms company defeated the guy who's militia put united state forces out of Mogadishu!

There are also problems with the united state and un, pouring $billions in to try to create a central government (to rob the people), and using the Ethiopian military as a proxy army of occupation.

Places like Puntland and Somaliland on the north coast of the horn are booming. Development since the dismantling of the state has been at a far faster rate than any of the areas of sub saharan Africa that is afflicted with a state.

 

[Deleted member 41765]

The illegal ones, if they have fake papers, are actually paying money into social security and income taxes that they will never be able to take back out.

Exactly! Well stated @scout86.

 

[Milo's papa]

@scout86 , .you go girl. I couldn't have said it any better. There are way too many people willing to blame the other guy for what is wrong in this country. How about we all take a close look at ourselves.