I say yes, you say no, OR People are Strange

IllinoisLady

IllinoisLady

The extremists who think T. Nugent is just swell apparently have chosen to forget just how they got here.  They should be wishing a lot more people had bad memories.  They are the ones who saw to it that scumbag Nugent got a seat at a State of the Union address.  As far as Nugent and his ilk, most of the people I know, including myself wouldn't pi** on them if they had been in the middle of a forest fire and needed to cool off. 

I may have to respect the soul ( as hard as it is ) but I sure don't have to respect anything else and even more so when such heathen attributes are displayed. 

Jackie

bluedahlia

Jackie, judging by what I have read "elsewhere", they are SCARED.....NERVOUS AND SCARED!  Maybe they should take the deadrocker's advice.

IllinoisLady

AGREE

Jackie

IllinoisLady

From today's Think Progress.

Paul Ryan’s Latest Rhetoric On
Poverty Doesn’t Add Up To Any New Ideas

Congressman
Paul Ryan (R-WI) introduced a new anti-poverty plan in a speech in Washington today. But
while Ryan is trying out new rhetoric around the issue of poverty, his
“American idea” is full of the same empty promises he’s been making for years,
this time with Ryan Rhetoric 2.0. His plan to fight poverty doesn’t include a
fair wage for hard work and would dismantle the safety net. We need an economy
that works for everyone, and Ryan’s cuts to low and moderate income Americans
are not what this country needs to continue to prosper.

Here
are a few things we know about his plan:

1.
The Math Doesn’t Add Up. Ryan claims his plan is
deficit-neutral. That’s a 180 degree turn from his budget proposal from earlier
this year, which gets over two-thirds of its cuts from programs helping low and
moderate income families. So either the plan is a dressed-up version of his
budget, or he has abandoned his goal to balance the budget.

2.
“Consolidation.” Ryan’s rhetoric calls it consolidation,
hoping you won’t notice he is actually cutting programs helping low and
moderate income Americans. And we already know that this strategy doesn’t work.
Ryan holds up the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program as a
model reform of the safety net. But under TANF, extreme poverty rose, fewer families received help, and
states were unable to respond to the Great Recession. Consolidating multiple
programs into a single funding stream would carry these same risks. In fact,
Ryan undermines his own argument by proposing to eliminate an
already-existing block grant, the Social Services Block Grant, calling it
“ineffective” (which, by the way, helps approximately 23 million people)

3.
Not Every Idea Ryan Proposes Is Without Merit.
Depending on the details, ideas such as reforming our criminal justice system
to give people the opportunity to rebuild their lives have a lot of merit and
could attract bipartisan support. In fact, Ryan is not a leader on this issue,
which has already had a bipartisan team of Senate champions in Sen. Cory Booker
(D-NJ) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY). On the whole, however, his plan would
exacerbate poverty and inequality.

If
Ryan were serious about cutting poverty, here are three policy ideas he could
embrace — taken from a column by the Center for American Progress’s Melissa Boteach:

1.
Increase The Minimum Wage. Ryan’s speech comes on the
day marking five years since the last federal minimum wage increase.
Progressive leaders and advocates around the country are marking the occasion
by taking the “Live The Wage” Challenge — walking in the shoes of a
minimum wage worker by living on the average minimum wage budget of $77 for one
week. It’s simply not enough to live on. Raising the minimum wage to $10.10
could lift as many as 4.6 million people out of poverty.

2.
Bring Our Work And Family Policies Into The 21st Century.
Women are now the primary breadwinners or co-breadwinners in nearly two-thirds of families, but our workplace policies
and public policies don’t reflect this change. One thing Rep. Ryan could do in
this realm is support the Family and Medical Insurance Leave Act, or FAMILY
Act, which would create a national paid leave program and stop the United
States from being the only developed country that with no paid maternity leave.
This is a critical poverty issue, as having a child is a major cause of poverty
for families that can’t afford to leave the workforce.

3.
Support High-Quality Child Care And Early Education. Poor
families who pay out of pocket for child care spend approximately one-third of their incomes just to be able to
work. Ryan could support policies to provide greater economic mobility for
low-income families, like Head Start. He could also sign onto the bipartisan Strong Start for America’s Children Act, which would invest
in preschool, quality child care for infants and toddlers, and home visiting as
a resource to pregnant women and mothers with young babies, simultaneously
helping parents work while boosting the future economic mobility of young
children.

Instead,
just a day after his speech, he and his House Republican colleagues will vote
tomorrow to exclude millions of low-income working families from the Child Tax
Credit, pushing millions of children deeper into poverty.

BOTTOM
LINE: Addressing poverty with more than rhetoric is the challenge our
country faces. America was not built on rhetoric, it was built on an idea that
if we came together and worked hard, we could create a nation full of
opportunity. There are policy proposals that exist that would help us do that —
create an economy that works for everyone, not just the wealthiest. Paul Ryan’s
latest rhetoric on poverty is not the answer we need.

 

Hasn't crawled out of the 'losers' corner' yet and I doubt he ever will.  Wanna-be that is all used up.  No new ideas.....worthless.  Another paid obstructionist.

Jackie

 

IllinoisLady

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/07/23/1316045/-Michele-Bachmann-announces-she-might-run-for-president-again  Impressed with ourselves, aren't we?????  Seems to happen to a lot of the bunch in the loser's corner.  Maybe she should......she'll be down and out I bet before the ink dries on her papers.  I'm sure someone will set her straight. 

Jackie

brigadoonbenson

I hope she does.  Michelle, The two Rocks, (I mean Ricks) Ted and all the other crazy candidates will make our victory more assured IF WE  AN GET OT THE VOTE!

QuinnCat

Oh joy....yes, the two Ricks and one Michelle equals craziness again - it was very entertaining last year.  Too bad the GOP limited debates this election (for that very reason - not to overexpose their crazies).  Can we bring back Herman Cain?

Might as well say it here.  Listening to the "we are victims" speech by Mark Rubio.  I just noticed HOW BIG his ears are.  

IllinoisLady

Like so many of the crazies with their "deep thoughts", Rubio is only a victim of himself.  So many of these people  look like they could be reasonable.  But, they open their mouths and prove you wrong every time.  They leave no doubt  --- bubbles in the brain.

Jackie

crazy4carrots

Didn't Rubio tell a whopper about his family's immigration -- as in, they came in 1957 and yet he claimed they were fleeing the Communists.  Just one (big) catch in that tale --  the revolution didn't happen until 2 years later when Batista was ousted and Castro took power.

So, really -- can anyone ever believe anything he says?  I heard his interview on NPR a week ago.  To paraphrase that famous line from the movie A Few Good Men -- "You can't TELL the truth."

bluedahlia

Runnin' scared

Runnin' blue

Goin' so fast

What'll I do

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAXlyhypQEE

RetiredLibby

His constant repetition of right-wing victimhood is really aggravating.  "Advocates for gay marriage are oooooopressssing supporters of 'traditional' marriage," he whines.  "They are iiiiinntollllleraaannnttt!"

Intolerance.  The wrong wing keeps using that word.  It does not mean what they think it means.

News flash, RWNJs: it is not intolerance to support people getting rights that you already have.  It is intolerance to oppose people getting rights you already have.  

Intolerance in this case is people trying to FORCE other people to marry people they do not want to marry, or to PREVENT people from marrying people they want to marry.  It is an action directed at specific groups of people.

I can assure you 100%, people who advocate for marriage equality do not want to force you to marry someone of the same sex or prevent you from marrying someone of the opposite sex.  They don't care WHO you marry, as long as it is human, over the legal age, and consenting.  They are asking that you afford them the same courtesy.

If the person in front of you at the ice cream counter orders chocolate, that has no bearing on your desire to have vanilla.  

IOW - if you disapprove or your religion forbids same-sex marriage and you decide to abide by that - DON'T MARRY SOMEONE OF THE SAME SEX.  MYOB when it comes to someone else's partner choices, unless they are not human, are under age, or are not consenting.  In that case, report to the proper authorities.  Otherwise - get your head out of someone else's business and tend to your own knitting.

IllinoisLady

RL, well said.  Puts me in mind that extremists are so sure they are right they can even change the meanings of words.  Tch.Tch. Should shut the mouth and keep the eyes and ears open for the VAST numbers who you will be unable to convince. 

Jackie

IllinoisLady

RetiredLibby

http://billmoyers.com/2013/05/29/u-s-poverty-by-the-numbers/

From Moyers & Co website:

US Poverty: By the Numbers

Updated July 24, 2014

by Greg Kaufmann

 US poverty (less than $19,090 for a family of three): 46.5 million people, 15 percent

Children in poverty: 16.4 million, 23 percent of all children, including 39.6 percent of African-American children and 33.7 percent of Latino children. Children are the poorest age group in the US

Deep poverty (less than $11,510 for a family of four): 20.4 million people, 1 in 15 Americans, including 7.1 million children

People who would have been in poverty if not for Social Security, 2012: 61.8 million (program kept 15.3 million people out of poverty)

People in the US experiencing poverty by age 65: Roughly half

Gender gap, 2012: Women 32 percent more likely to be poor than men

Gender gap, 2011: Women 34 percent more likely to be poor than men

Twice the poverty level (less than $46,042 for a family of four): 106 million people, more than 1 in 3 Americans

Jobs in the US paying less than $34,000 a year: 50 percent

Jobs in the US paying below the poverty line for a family of four, less than $23,000 annually: 25 percent

Poverty-level wages, 2011: 28 percent of workers

Percentage of individuals and family members in poverty who either worked or lived with a working family member, 2011: 57 percent

Families receiving cash assistance, 1996: 68 for every 100 families living in poverty

Families receiving cash assistance, 2011: 27 for every 100 families living in poverty

Impact of public policy, 2010: Without government assistance, poverty would have been twice as high — nearly 30 percent of population

Percentage of entitlement benefits going to elderly, disabled or working households, 2010: Over 90 percent

Number of homeless children in US public schools: 1,168,354

Annual cost of child poverty nationwide: $500 billion

Federal expenditures on home ownership mortgage deductions, 2014 estimate: $101.5 billion

Federal funding for low-income housing assistance programs, 2012: Less than $50 billion

Unless otherwise noted, all figures are based on 2012 Census Data on poverty, the most recent released.

bluedahlia

deadrocker

IllinoisLady

Blue

brigadoonbenson

Robert Reich posted this about an hour ago - I can see arguments on both sides.  What is your opinion?

In New York, if you build a luxury apartment building that includes some units for low-income people you get to add more luxury floors beyond what the zoning laws normally allow, which means big money.  It’s called “inclusionary zoning,” and it’s a good idea – except when low-income residents have to enter through a separate door at the back of the building, use an elevator that serves only their ...low-income floors, and have no access to amenities enjoyed by the luxury crowd. This is the design for a 33-story building to be built on Riverside Boulevard between 61st and 62nd streets, owned by Extell Development Company and various entities of private equity giant The Carlyle Group. The shared luxury amenities include full-size basketball courts and swimming pools, but low-income residents whose apartments are accessible only through the back door don't share in them; they get their own “community room” on the ground floor. Developers shouldn't be able to pretend this is inclusion, and thereby reap the financial benefits; it's just another form of exclusion. (For the record, the Bloomberg administration approved this, not De Blasio's.)

Being rich in America today means not having to come across anyone who isn’t.

 

IllinoisLady

Someone will likely come up with good arguments, but just from off the top of my head, though I see it,  I still think the last words are almost too valid.  " Being rich in America today means not having to come across anyone who isn't".

I see it as money should not exclude you from having empathy for the plight of others.  I would feel better about it if the residents all used the same entry door.   It seems to me a "community room" is taking the place of amenities and while I can see that to some extent.....I feel like the poorer group should have access to those same amenities -- even if it has to be a "scheduled time".    I'm sure the rich already have a huge share of what this building will offer them so making the poorer people invisible  to me would not be so viable.  I think there is too much placating so rich people can get richer and have it their way.    Just goes to show how often money or lack there-of can become a poor yard-stick. 

Jackie

( just instant thought upon reading the above ).

lassie11

It's apartheid - separating the rich and the poor. It's not OK.

Bren-2007

Hi Guys,

Busy cleaning today.  I am sick of it.  Wish I had some real work come in, but there hasn't been any this week.

My mom is coming up next Wednesday and will stay with me until Friday, then we go up to Roanoke and celebrate my sis' birthday with her.  Should be fun.  I always use my mom's visits as a good reason to do a lot of cleaning ... and the funny thing is she could care less.

Brigadoon ... That article was very disturbing.  I can understand that the rich folks would want those amenities to themselves as they are paying for them and that lifestyle.  It's just so bizarre that the poor folks have to come in the back door and not be seen.  I think this is an experiment that is going to fail. Whoever thought up this zoning law was nuts or else in the pocket of the rich developers.

hugs,

Bren

brigadoonbenson

I definitely agree with the last statement.

Still, when I go to a hotel and purchase a less expensive room there are floors on the elevator that are restricted and to which I don't have access.  The people who do have access to those floors get cozy bathrobes and complimentary food, flowers, etc. Often times they have a separate entrance or escort.  They pay a premium for those and I am happy that my room is nice and meets my needs at the cheaper rate. 

I travel coach on an airplane.  I would like to have a bigger seat and more leg room, maybe a nice meal or on a long flight one of those things I see on ads that show a separate cubicle that makes into a bed.  I cannot afford that but I am happy about the special rate that I found and I am not sure I would pay $1200 more to have those amenities.

I think I would be glad to have an apartment in a nice area at a price that I can afford.  I think I might even get a little pleasure out of the fact that I am paying a lot less for the good location than the people who live around me.  I don't think it would bother me to not be able to use the amenities or the same entrance.  I would be glad to not have to see all those people who live a life that is out of my sphere and would celebrate the anonymity  of entering and leaving in my old coat and comfy shoes, no make-up, etc. 

Where I live right now is country.  My neighbors down the road have lots of money to spend.  Their houses are much nicer than mine and they drive nice cars, take great vacations and have lots of toys.  (In full disclosure, they also happen to be my kids.) The neighbors up the road live in  trailers, doublewides, old dilapidated houses, a couple are on subsistence.  One is confined to a wheelchair and they have cars that run sometimes. 

We share the same road and the people who have tractors or snow equipment dig out the ones who don't.  If there is an emergency we help one another and aren't afraid to call for that help.  We all know that we have different resources but it just is. 

It will never be perfect and it definitely needs to be A LOT MORE balanced but I think this law was a step in the right direction.  It opens the door to low income people allowing for opportunities to escape from the ghetto confines of poorly maintained buildings, bad landlords, etc. There is an inclusive aspect to this that I think has more value that the exclusion from some of the trappings.

alexandria58

The difference here, Brigadoon, is that the developer is getting something from the government in exchange for creating low-income apartments - they are getting to build more apartments and thereby make more money because they are being "inclusive."  They are getting a waiver of zoning laws. And the rich people buying those apartments are getting a government benefit because there are more apartments available, and therefore, the price should be lower, and even if not, rich people who otherwise couldn't get an apartment, will be able to get one. So it isn't purely a question of you get what you pay for.  If you get a tax break on your luxury house, with the agreement that you will allow access to your 100 acres as a park - then you only let the poor people use 10 acres, while everyone else can use the entire park, then, to my mind, you are not living up to the bargain you struck.  This strikes me as the same sort of deal.

IllinoisLady

Interesting thoughts.   I have some EXTREMELY well off friends.  Thing is -- when I'm with them, I never think about this and I don't think they do either.  We just enjoy being around one another.  I feel like I've earned everything I have and they did the same.  Of course there is a big difference.  I still think  until we quit seeing all the things that make us different, we won't recognize how much we are all the same.  There is something for an extremist to chew on.  We are all in life together and it MATTERS what we do.

Jackie

IllinoisLady

Nugent just got cancelled out of a double header at a casino in Tacoma, Washington.  The Puyallup Native Tribe.  While they believe in your right to make statements, when they are so deeply racist and so highly derogatory, they don't feel it behooves to stand still.  I'm with them.  I still feel he , like Limbaugh loves the "applause" for the shock statements.....but a good old fashioned saying here...." the chickens will eventually come home to roost ".  Limbaugh found that out.  Funny that anyone would even expect to keep their gig and make money off of the very people who you so easily cast aspersions on as though it is fact.  You are getting some very JUST desserts here. 

Jackie

djd

Regarding Ted Nugent, the hero of the right, below is an interview he did in 1977, admitting to being a draft dodger.  He actually pooped and pissed his pants to avoid going to Vietnam.  Further, it is common knowledge that Ted Nugent, in 1978, "began a relationship with seventeen-year-old Pele Massa. Due to the age difference they could not marry so Nugent joined Massa's parents in signing documents to make himself her legal guardian, an arrangement that Spin magazine ranked in October 2000 as #63 on their list of the "100 Sleaziest Moments in Rock"

***

---

Interviewer: How did you get out of the draft?

Ted Nugent: Ted was a  young boy, appearing to be a hippie but quite opposite in fact, working hard and  playing hard, playing rock and roll like a deviant. People would question my  sanity, I played so much. So I got my notice to be in the draft. Do you think I  was gonna lay down my guitar and go play army? Give me a break! I was busy doin'  it to it. I had a career Jack. If I was walkin' around, hippying down, getting'  loaded and pickin' my ass like your common curs, I'd say "Hey yeah, go in the  army. Beats the poop out of scuffin' around in the gutters." But I wasn't a  gutter dog. I was a hard workin', mother****in' rock and roll musician.

I  got my physical notice 30 days prior to. Well, on that day I ceased cleansing my  body. No more brushing my teeth, no more washing my hair, no baths, no soap, no  water. Thirty days of debris build. I stopped shavin' and I was 18, had a little  scraggly beard, really looked like a hippie. I had long hair, and it started  gettin' kinky, matted up. Then two weeks before, I stopped eating any food with  nutritional value. I just had chips, Pepsi, beer-stuff I never touched-buttered  poop, little jars of Polish sausages, and I'd drink the syrup, I was this side  of death, Then a week before, I stopped going to the bathroom. I did it in my  pants. poop, piss the whole shot. My pants got crusted up.

See, I  approached the whole thing like, Ted Nugent, cool hard-workin' dude, is gonna  wreak havoc on these imbeciles in the armed forces. I'm gonna play their own  game, and I'm gonna destroy 'em. Now my whole body is crusted in poop and piss.  I was ill. And three or four days before, I started stayin' awake. I was close  to death, but I was in control. I was extremely antidrug as I've always been,  but I snorted some crystal methedrine. Talk about one wounded motherf*cker. A  guy put up four lines, and it was for all four of us, but I didn't know and I'm  vacuuming that poop right up. I was a walking, talking hunk of human poop. I was  six-foot-three of sin. So the guys took me down to the physical, and my nerves,  my emotions were distraught. I was not a good person. I was wounded. But as  painful and nauseous as it was — 'cause I was really into bein' clean and on the  ball — I made gutter swine hippies look like football players. I was deviano.

So I went in, and those guys in uniform couldn't believe the smell. They  were ridiculin' me and pushin' me around and I was cryin', but all the time I  was laughin' to myself. When they stuck the needle in my arm for the blood test  I passed out, and when I came to they were kicking me into the wall. Then they  made everybody take off their pants, and I did, and this sergeant says, "Oh my  God, put those back on! You f*cking swine you!" Then they had a urine test and I  couldn't piss, But my poop was just like ooze, man, so I poop in the cup and put  it on the counter. I had poop on my hand and my arm. The guy almost puked. I was  so proud. I knew I had these chumps beat. The last thing I remember was wakin'  up in the ear test booth and they were sweepin' up. So I went home and cleaned  up.

They took a putty knife to me. I got the street rats out of my hair,  ate some good steaks, beans, potatoes, cottage cheese, milk. A couple of days  and I was ready to kick ass. And in the mail I got this big juicy 4-F. They'd call dead people before they’d call my ass. But you  know the funny thing about it? I'd make an incredible army man. I'd be a colonel  before you knew what hit you, and I'd have the baddest bunch of motherf*ckin'  killers you'd ever seen in my platoon. But I just wasn't into it. I was too busy  doin' my own thing, you know?
Read more at http://www.snopes.com/politics/military/nugent.as...

******

Now, here's Ted Nugent being quite literally embraced and placed center-stage by the Republican establishment, long after he admitted to being a draft dodger and taking guardianship of a 17-year old girl so he could have sex with her.

IllinoisLady

WWJS --- I read that about this Nugent before.  How clever Ted !!!!  You totally degraded yourself and all man-kind.  Excuse me if I can't bring myself to appreciate your cleverness.  I'll just put it this way....we never know when Karma is going to show up, but I'd imagine when it does you'll be remembering your cleverness and likely not in a good way. 

Jackie

lassie11

I read another article where he later said that he fibbed about the getting out of the draft thing. But he did get out of the draft. So did he fib earlier or later?

 

IllinoisLady

Do you think there is a possibility he sobered up from drugs or alcohol and realized how he sounded.....guess it doesn't much matter to me.  He is full of scorn and derisiveness for the Office of the President and I know some will say....no, just for THIS President.    There have been Presidents I didn't like one bit, but I said very little and when I did it was not to anyone but my husband.  We talked privately about our dislike and sometimes disdain because it was still our United States and it was still an Oval Office. 

I could say a lot about the previous White House tenant and his band of thugs.  Our President has spent an enormous time in his Presidency trying to un-do all of the damage and has had to do it with his hands tied and every road block that could be used has been....and more to come.  It is a pitiful bunch that has wasted over 5 years trying to destroy or obstruct any gain, or any legacy.  They come off as not only inept at their elected positions but the less than well-thought out and organized plans to disrupt and obstruct the President have mainly back-fired.  We have so far paid big money for their ignorant partisan politics.  Some people have good memories and for those who don't.....their is Internet, interviews and the extremists.  

Jackie 

crazy4carrots

My parents always warned me that I would be "known"  (as in, my reputation) by the company I kept.  So I guess for people like Simple Sarah and Rick Perry, we have a pretty good idea of the kind of people they really are, through their association with the scumbag Nugent.  And I guess that goes for the Tea Party in general, doesn't it?