Stitch said:
Answer: because you, the American people, have let it. Every single time you vote on a party line without thinking about the issues at hand, every time you toss rabid accusations at the 'other side' while turning a blind eye to the shortcomings of 'your side', every time you make excuses for your preferred candidates while they screw over the values you hold dear, every time you let some windbag political 'commentator' on tv tell you how you ought to think, every time you say something like "I can't even understand how you can support YOUR party, because everybody knows they're stupid and wrong about everything, whereas MY party is righteous and saintly and perfect," the politicians give themselves a pat on the back and a little piece of America dies.
Here you are lecturing the 40% or less of the population who actually votes when 60% just sit there and let shit hit the fan for doing nothing. Sheep exist everywhere whether we lecture em or not, but if you don't vote you're simply letting someone else make an opinion for you. At the very least, the 40% of people actually voting have made up their minds to know that politics matters, and that's a step above NOT voting. Consider since there will always be sheep that you as a more intelligent voter may be able to use them as your tool to get your opinion out to people who's opinions actually matter, or something. I'm not saying to astroturf, but it's like being the salesman of a philosophy.
Seriously, though, way to condescend on the voting populace. This is as much the fault of people who have too much apathy to vote as it is people being sheeped around, because the majority of the former makes the latter's influence that more disproportional to the actual will/proper representation of the people.
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Edit: BTW rostam, I can see how minimum wage could possibly hurt small business owners in theory, but there's a lot of unlikely circumstances I think have to come into play for that to occur, and I disagree that the costs will end up going back to the consumer as if they weren't already. This country favors shit to LOOK cheap, that's why companies outsource it and shuffle cash around to make items in like China, then sell it back to you for 89 cents and you think you're saving money while all the while the value of your cash goes down and so does the US economy. On the macro scale, anything you can think to do to close the wealth gap in this country will simply have the wealthy outsource it to get around it anyway, it seems. Costs of many items are below their actual value, it's just a matter of time before this catches up to us :I
That besides the current minimum wage is waaay below the earnings of your average american worker, which wasn't always the case. The elasticity of minimum wage workers in this country is low (we need a certain number of unskilled labor jobs regardless of their pay). I believe that market power needs to be balanced more between the companies and the consumer, and that minimum wage increase would be a way to promote that more healthy relationship (or, it could promote companies to try and get around the law by outsourcing or hiring more illegals -- either way it will make the situation much less ambiguous as to what we SHOULD be doing to fix a fxcked up economy). I Am Not An Economistâ„¢ but I did just google this issue and I found out that economists in general seem to prefer Antitrust litigation over minimum wage increases to "get the job done" restoring power balance to the consumer. I think antitrust litigation's been busted ever since SBC started consolodating Ma Bell (and let's not forget Microsoft's slap on the wrist which basically did nothing to stop their monopoly), so maybe minimum wage hikes will get the snowball rolling to tell the bigshots that we the american people mean business.
Sorry, I'm getting off track..... :T
Edit2:
I read a lot of news and listen to talk radio. All I ever hear is about the corruption of Democrats.
Talk radio's the realm of the conservatives -- the news, while often painted as liberal, generally tries to follow guidelines of journalistic ethics towards things like ad hominem attacks. Generally. Talking heads like Wolf Blitzer are increasingly blurring the line between NPOV and obvious opinion. Still, Even a little bit of slander can slip underneath the radar on talk radio thanks in part to its fluidic nature -- you can't get away with that on TV unless your name is Fox News (whereby nobody with more than half a brain takes you seriously anyway).
BTW, I am
shocked that you claim to listen to a lot of news and barely know who jack abramoff is. I'm not super surprised you don't know who Duke Cunningham is, but I am somewhat disappointed -- that also made news and his name should be about as well-known as William Jefferson.
Finally, Hypothetical question. What's worse to you, a corrupt politician who doesn't deny some of his comrades might grease the wheels, or a corrupt politican that claims that his comrades are all saints? (Personally, I think the flat-faced liars are the lesser-trustworthy of the two, and much more dangerous to the american people)
