US Politics - 2020 Presidential Election - GOP v Dem cage fight (ENTER AT YOUR PERIL)

[froot loops]

To me if you can vote on the supreme court candidates on a straight vote withoit worry of the filibuster, then the filibuster should be eliminated.

[Da Geezer]

Calvin College and Seminary, if you must know. Started at the college initially, then to the seminary, where I decided it wasn't the place or profession for me. I didn't mesh with the community of believers and it was straining my faith. So we had a mutual parting of ways (that and about $20,000 paid to them).

I went to Hope undergrad, so we can discuss Calvinism and the Protestant Work Ethic any time you want. I was the only class ever to go through Hope losing all 8 basketball games to Calvin.

so proud.

[chemiclord]

Not much to discuss really. The Protestant work ethic is perfectly fine as a personal guide to your life, extremely problematic when you try to impose it on others, especially if you don't know the circumstances of their lives.

As far as Calvinism goes, I wholly reject it at this point. Predestination is a bullshit ever changing rationale that John Calvin used to justify his abuses of power with little concern for any real coherence. And no, I'm done debating Calvinists on this topic, and I won't with you, either.

[Da Geezer]

Yeah as long as the filibuster is in place, there is no chance of Roe being codified. Sinema and Manchin are against removing the filibuster and it's unclear how many senators would commit to making an exception to pass a Roe-like law. Currently it's more than 40 and less than 48. There are afew senators who are willing to let Manchin and Sinema take the arrows for something they wouldn't be in favor of either.

A lot of people can run on things but it's very hard to get anything passed that can't be done on a reconciliation bill.

Obama had a very short window of 60 senators but I'm not even sure if they were alll pro choice then. And at the time they were fooled into thinking believing this justices when they said it was settled law that they weren't lying. And all of those candidates were lying.

Froot, I'll say it again. The Dems used the filibuster over 300 times during the Trump presidency. Can't you see the hypocrisy?

Truth is, Dem drones such as yourself know that if abortion on demand or gay marriage were put to a vote, they would fail nationally. The reason you want to pack the SC is that you know you are out of step with the majority on these matters and you know the only way of imposing your view on others is to use the SC. Again, why not just comply with Dodd and see what happens in the states as the population actually has a chance to vote on these matters?

You know the reason. The majority of Democrats don't even know what Dodd said, and none of the progs here are even willing to read the opinion. Eager to be ignorant.

[Da Geezer]

Not much to discuss really. The Protestant work ethic is perfectly fine as a personal guide to your life, extremely problematic when you try to impose it on others, especially if you don't know the circumstances of their lives.

As far as Calvinism goes, I wholly reject it at this point. Predestination is a bullshit ever changing rationale that John Calvin used to justify his abuses of power with little concern for any real coherence. And no, I'm done debating Calvinists on this topic, and I won't with you, either.

I'll respect that.

But I will say that the Protestant Church during Reformation developed a theology that was based on man nature being evil (depraved in Calvin-speak). Sola Scriptura and "priesthood of all believers" and all that. That set the philosophical groundwork for Capitalism. That is something pretty important for progs to understand.

Oh, and the usual subjects have accused me of being rabidly anti-Catholic in another thread. CANCEL HIM and all that.

You would do well to try to understand capitalism before you reject it. The US was the most prosperous country in the history of the world under capitalist philosophy. As relevantly, China couldn't feed its own people under communism until they adopted some aspects of capitalism.

You ever ask yourself why socialism has failed everywhere it has been tried?

[Da Geezer]

To me if you can vote on the supreme court candidates on a straight vote withoit worry of the filibuster, then the filibuster should be eliminated.

The filibuster HAS been eliminated for "supreme court candidates". Try to keep up.

[chemiclord]

I'll respect that.

but I will say that the Protestant Church during Reformation developed a theology that was based on man nature being evil. Sola Scriptura and "priesthood of all believers" and all that. That set the philosophical groundwork for Capitalism. That is something pretty important for progs to understand/

Oh, the usual subjects have accused me of being rabidly anti-Catholic in another threat. CANCEL HIM and all that.

You would do well to try to understand capitalism before you reject it. The US was the most prosperous country in the history of the world under capitalist philosophy. As relevantly, China couldn't feed its own people under communism until they adopted some aspects of capitalism.

You ever ask yourself why socialism has failed everywhere it has been tried?

You think I'm particularly a socialist. It failed for much the same reason that most revolutions quickly turn into autocratic hellholes; the sort of people who are willing to completely overthrow a government and willing to throw other people's lives away to gain power tend to be the last people who should be trusted with that power. It's, in my opinion, a fatal flaw on Marxism; it's predicated on the idea that the government will cede power to the proletariat, which is... not something that ever happens. And what do you do when the government that yields power... doesn't? Marxism really doesn't give an answer beyond, another revolution, I guess; and that somewhere at the end of that matryoshka doll is a communist utopia.

What you don't want to seem to accept is that unfettered capitalism is just autocracy of a different kind. It's essentially feudalism, all the way down to the inherited wealth that creates a ruling class that is functionally exactly the same as the nobles lording over the peasants with little freedom of their own. Look at the first Guilded Age as an example of that. The company cities... specific company currency that could only be used in specific company owned stores... the rules against movement... tell me how that is particularly different than the serfdoms of medieval Europe?

So, yeah, I rather reject your binary thinking. Regulated capitalism is not communism. Taxing wealth is not communism. In fact, I'd argue it's the only way to ensure real innovation and merit-based growth that isn't predicated on either A) being born into the right family or B) what amounts to blind luck.

[CGVT]

Socialism. Jesus fucking Christ. The Socialism bogey man rears its ignorant head again.

See, here's the rub. Nobody, except for a few nut jobs wants true socialism in this country. What is wanted is the kind of socialism that we already have. The kind that pays for your roads and snow plows, your police forces, fire departments, military, colleges and universities, your medicare, medicade and social security etc. You know, the kind that the majority of Americans favor.

When I bring that up, I get "You don't even know what socialism is. Venezuela!".

Well, yes, I do. "You" don't know what it is.

[Da Geezer]

You think I'm particularly a socialist. It failed for much the same reason that most revolutions quickly turn into autocratic hellholes; the sort of people who are willing to completely overthrow a government and willing to throw other people's lives away to gain power tend to be the last people who should be trusted with that power. It's, in my opinion, a fatal flaw on Marxism; it's predicated on the idea that the government will cede power to the proletariat, which is... not something that ever happens. And what do you do when the government that yields power... doesn't? Marxism really doesn't give an answer beyond, another revolution, I guess; and that somewhere at the end of that matryoshka doll is a communist utopia.

What you don't want to seem to accept is that unfettered capitalism is just autocracy of a different kind. It's essentially feudalism, all the way down to the inherited wealth that creates a ruling class that is functionally exactly the same as the nobles lording over the peasants with little freedom of their own. Look at the first Guilded Age as an example of that. The company cities... specific company currency that could only be used in specific company owned stores... the rules against movement... tell me how that is particularly different than the serfdoms of medieval Europe?

So, yeah, I rather reject your binary thinking. Regulated capitalism is not communism. Taxing wealth is not communism. In fact, I'd argue it's the only way to ensure real innovation and merit-based growth that isn't predicated on either A) being born into the right family or B) what amounts to blind luck.

Do you think man's nature is evil or good?

[chemiclord]

I think man's "nature" is largely like any great primate; built around tribes and tribal identity. How that maps to "evil" or "good" is a largely futile exercise, because both are consistently moving targets. One million years ago "good" was simply survival of the tribe. Nowadays, what we think is "good" is much more complex but still struggling with the hardwired tribalism that is at the heart of a lot of what we now would consider "evil."

[Da Geezer]

Socialism. Jesus fucking Christ. The Socialism bogey man rears its ignorant head again.

See, here's the rub. Nobody, except for a few nut jobs wants true socialism in this country. What is wanted is the kind of socialism that we already have. The kind that pays for your roads and snow plows, your police forces, fire departments, military, colleges and universities, your medicare, medicade and social security etc. You know, the kind that the majority of Americans favor.

When I bring that up, I get "You don't even know what socialism is. Venezuela!".

Well, yes, I do. "You" don't know what it is.

police,

At least you admit it is "the kind of socialism we already have".

I'm no anarchist. I believe there is a limited role for government. It should do on behalf of the community what no single person would do. I'm in favor of police forces, snow plows, military, and the like. These are considered "common goods". One of the best examples of a common good was when the State of Michigan introduced Coho salmon and then Chinook salmon into the Great Lakes.

I think benefitting the old, infirm, widows and orphans is also something that a decent society does. The Bible mandates this, which I'm sure matters to you.

Then you come to colleges and universities and government education. I'd favor anything done voluntarily and funded voluntarily. I don't think one man should pay for the education of another. If you pay for something, you tend to value it more. The US was the most literate nation in the world in 1860 even including slaves in the calculation. The Dewey system has brought us to where? 32nd? The reason I've spent so much time in the last 25 years working on charter schools and on vouchers is I believe government funding should follow the child

One of the truest statements I've heard is John Acton's axiom: "Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts absolutely."

Where that is particularly true is in the welfare system. We were promised that the Great Society would "cure poverty". $ 20 Trillion has been spent ($50 Trillion in today's dollars) and poverty rates are higher than when we started in the mid-1960s. How can this be? Well, the politicians (with power) found out that they could use taxpayer money to buy votes. Then they found that they could create government jobs that they unionized so the government workers pay their unions who pay the politicians who pay the government workers. That's how you end up with teachers making over $ 100,000 per year for a part-time job. Now, over 50% of the country is on some form of welfare and another large percentage of the population depends on government spending for their jobs. And, let's face it, much of what bureaucrats do is totally nonproductive. That is how coastal elites and lawyers control the country.

The socialism I fear, and what we have now, is when everyone in the country is being carried by fewer and fewer productive members of society. So, I say he who does not work shall not eat. That is also from the Bible.

[Da Geezer]

I think man's "nature" is largely like any great primate; built around tribes and tribal identity. How that maps to "evil" or "good" is a largely futile exercise, because both are consistently moving targets. One million years ago "good" was simply survival of the tribe. Nowadays, what we think is "good" is much more complex but still struggling with the hardwired tribalism that is at the heart of a lot of what we now would consider "evil."

No, the nature of man has been the same since history began. Tribal instincts exist in all of nature. Think of ants or birds. Tribalism is not the source of good or evil. It is just a fact.

But I asked about human nature.

When I ask about whether man is good or evil, I believe that is the crucial question when discussing human society. There is nothing futile about it, except when you are consciously trying to avoid the ramifications of your answer. I believe you want to be good, and you want man to be good and you want to signal that you are good. Understandable. But what happens to a society when we assume this? You try to get Plato's Republic, but you end up with chaos in Syracuse.

You made an interesting statement in one of your posts that anyone who leads a communist or socialist revolution tends to do it for power, which then dooms the revolution's idealistic goals. Power just never seems to get turned back to the proletariat. As I said to CGVT, Power tends to corrupt. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. That is what history shows. In fact, I'd argue that power and money are actually interchangeable. I believe Trump in 2016 turned money into power while Hillary was trying to turn power into money. The two are basically the same thing.

I say that money or power tends to corrupt. And that is because man's nature is evil.

When you believe man is inherently evil certain things that you term "futile" make sense. Why does socialism fail everywhere it is tried? Well, socialism generally means putting the best men in charge and expecting good things. That is what the 1910-26 Progressives believed. Have professional, well-educated bureaucrats run the government. What the experts chose to do was to reintegrate the armed forces, and let Margaret Sanger try to "cleanse" the black population from society. The Depression happened and on Hoover's watch no less. He was such a great administrator that they named the dam after him. There are countless examples. But everywhere, when men had power, wrong outcomes followed. I believe that is because man's nature is evil. I believe the collectivists will never reach a just society by putting good men in charge because they can't find the incorruptible man.

I happen to think the best we can do is to atomize power whenever we can. Same thing with large accumulations of money. And we would fear the combination of government power and big business like Twitter and Facebook most of all. That is what fascism actually is: privately owned corporations doing what they are told to do by the politicians. Vast wealth to the corporations. Vast power to the government.

[CGVT]

Jesus Christ. You spew the same shit once again

Teachers are part time employees!

Some sort of welfare? Jesus.

Taxpayer money to buy votes!

Unions are evil!

All government workers are on the dole.

Same old shit

Tell us who you think should be allowed to vote?

And...Education should be paid for through taxes and be provided for free for the good of society. Public Education is the backbone of our society.

BTW,


Charter schools fail at astounding rate, report says


More than 850,000 students were displaced during a 28-year period from those schools closing, according to research from the Network for Public Education.
ByChris Burt
August 6, 2020
The Network for Public Education released a report on Thursday that shows charter schools across the United States failed half the time during a 28-year stretch and more than one quarter of them folded within the first five years.

The study, Broken Promises: An Analysis of Charter School Closures from 1999-2017, also shows how initial investment in developing charter schools was often squandereed. Nearly $1 billion of the overall $4 billion given through the U.S. Department of Education’s Charter Schools Program, “was given to schools that never opened as well as to many that were opened and then closed,” according to the research.

One of the many critical takeaways from the NPE report is the effect that the closures had on students. More than 850,000 children, including many from lower-income and minority areas, were displaced during that period because of charter school shutdowns.

“I had students whose high school experience was completed at three different schools because of closing after closing,” said Dountonia Batts, an NPE Action Board member and former Indiana charter school teacher, agreed with the findings of the report. “The students who often feel the hurt first are in black and brown communities, where the charter product is cynically peddled as a civil rights solution.”

In performing the study, policy researcher Ryan Pfelgler analyzed statistics from the Common Core of Data, pinpointing failures at 3-, 5-, 10- and 15-year marks, while highlighting three economically challenged cities – Detroit, Milwaukee and Tucson, Ariz. His team culled through records of more than 2 million charter schools. They found that charter schools that failed did so due to a number of factors, including academic accountability, “mismanagement and fraud.”

“If we added closures prior to 1999 and subsequent to 2017, it is likely that one million students have been displaced,” he said.

Added NPE Executive Director Carol Burris: “Even by year five, less time than it takes for a child to complete elementary school, 27% of new charter schools had disappeared.”

The NPE and researchers offered a number of recommendations beyond their extensive study, to further understand the impact closures have had on students and their communities, including:

• Creating a federal database to track the closing of charter schools
• Study further the financial costs to families who invest their time and money in activities and items required by those schools
• More closely investigate schools and potential illegal activities before those schools shut down.

“The public school should be a stable institution in every community, always there for children and families,” said education historian Diane Ravitch. “Unfortunately, as this report shows, charter schools are inherently unstable. Charters fail for a variety of reasons, mainly because they are a market mechanism, like shoe stores or restaurants—here today, gone tomorrow.”


And with that, I'm done

[Da Geezer]

Jesus Christ. You spew the same shit once again

Teachers are part time employees!

Some sort of welfare? Jesus.

Taxpayer money to buy votes!

Unions are evil!

All government workers are on the dole.

Same old shit

Tell us who you think should be allowed to vote?

And...Education should be paid for through taxes and be provided for free for the good of society. Public Education is the backbone of our society.

BTW,


Charter schools fail at astounding rate, report says


More than 850,000 students were displaced during a 28-year period from those schools closing, according to research from the Network for Public Education.
ByChris Burt
August 6, 2020
The Network for Public Education released a report on Thursday that shows charter schools across the United States failed half the time during a 28-year stretch and more than one quarter of them folded within the first five years.

The study, Broken Promises: An Analysis of Charter School Closures from 1999-2017, also shows how initial investment in developing charter schools was often squandereed. Nearly $1 billion of the overall $4 billion given through the U.S. Department of Education’s Charter Schools Program, “was given to schools that never opened as well as to many that were opened and then closed,” according to the research.

One of the many critical takeaways from the NPE report is the effect that the closures had on students. More than 850,000 children, including many from lower-income and minority areas, were displaced during that period because of charter school shutdowns.

“I had students whose high school experience was completed at three different schools because of closing after closing,” said Dountonia Batts, an NPE Action Board member and former Indiana charter school teacher, agreed with the findings of the report. “The students who often feel the hurt first are in black and brown communities, where the charter product is cynically peddled as a civil rights solution.”

In performing the study, policy researcher Ryan Pfelgler analyzed statistics from the Common Core of Data, pinpointing failures at 3-, 5-, 10- and 15-year marks, while highlighting three economically challenged cities – Detroit, Milwaukee and Tucson, Ariz. His team culled through records of more than 2 million charter schools. They found that charter schools that failed did so due to a number of factors, including academic accountability, “mismanagement and fraud.”

“If we added closures prior to 1999 and subsequent to 2017, it is likely that one million students have been displaced,” he said.

Added NPE Executive Director Carol Burris: “Even by year five, less time than it takes for a child to complete elementary school, 27% of new charter schools had disappeared.”

The NPE and researchers offered a number of recommendations beyond their extensive study, to further understand the impact closures have had on students and their communities, including:

• Creating a federal database to track the closing of charter schools
• Study further the financial costs to families who invest their time and money in activities and items required by those schools
• More closely investigate schools and potential illegal activities before those schools shut down.

“The public school should be a stable institution in every community, always there for children and families,” said education historian Diane Ravitch. “Unfortunately, as this report shows, charter schools are inherently unstable. Charters fail for a variety of reasons, mainly because they are a market mechanism, like shoe stores or restaurants—here today, gone tomorrow.”

https://www.publiccharters.org/lates...eckless-swipes

Any moron can cut and paste propaganda paid for by the teachers' unions. You are welcome to read this treatment of your "report". The lies your report contains have been thoroughly debunked in the three years since it was written.

I've forgotten more about charter schools than you'll ever know because I ran one for 16 years. When we were building a charter school in Canton MI, we had over 1,900 applicants for 700 seats. Charter schools take their students by lottery. Can you explain why 1,900 students wanted to get into a new school? I knew I had found my niche when I was selling something for free that the government required that my customers buy..

Charter Academies outperform government schools at all grade levels even though government schools nationally are primarily white and charters are primarily black and brown. Inner city government schools have such a bad performance that not one student in the Baltimore district read at grade level in 11th grade. None. Detroit is basically the same.

And the reason I know government teachers are dramatically overpaid is that I have experience with that too. In 2012, my last year running a charter, the state paid charters 63% of the base grant that a government school in the district of the charter school would get. So if the base were $ 10,000 per student, we would get $ 6,300. With that $ 6,300 we had to provide the building and busses and all operating expenses. We had one principal for 660 students and paid our teachers only moderately less than the union scale. Where we saved money is in pension and other benefits. Government schools pay about $ 50,000 per teacher for health and pension. We offered a 3% match on a 401(k) and standard insurance (not the expensive MESSA -union-owned insurer). And we had money left over

Put it this way, if all public schools were charters, there would be no school operating millage or building debt retirement on your property tax bill.

And there would be money left over.

[CGVT]

Any moron can spew bullshit as facts and call anything that disagrees with his position propaganda. We've had this "discussion" before. Your claims were debunked. I'm not playing fuck-fuck with you again.

And... That's why I'm out.