Maybe it’s because she’s been making more sense than anybody else in her party on the health care reform issue, so it was time to say something stupid. Or perhaps she perceived it was time to refurbish her liberal credentials since on this issue she has been sounding not liberal enough. Whatever the excuse, Democrat Sen. Mary Landrieu delivered nonsense that has typified her utterances on public policy issues.
Louisiana’s sensible Sen. David Vitter, a Republican, did not allow Senate Democrats a pass in refusing to renew a decade-old standard that mandated that many unemployed people who live in public housing to do eight hours of community service a month. Many exceptions apply so that it applies only to those who are able and do not have caretaking commitments. As Vitter pointed out, this is an entire sensible requirement for able, unemcumbered people living in a community to do something for the community who are not otherwise contributing to society through their economic output.
Enough Democrats grudgingly supported the amendment for it to be restored, but not after Landrieu excoriated the idea, calling it “mean-spirited.” The inanity of her objection from the Senate floor deserves full disclosure:
What I don’t support is making people and mostly minorities do community service while other people sit on the sideline and are never required to do it even if the largesse given by their government is much greater than a resident of public housing could get if they lived there for 50 years. If you lived there for 50 years you could not possibly benefit as much from the general treasury as you would if you were the executive of AIG who we just gave a gazillion dollars to. Did we ask him to do eight hours of community service? We didn’t even ask him to pay the money back.
Where to begin with this illogical rant? First, if Landrieu objects to the situation where some people who receive government benefits don’t have to participate in community service, then she should support a law that would require every able-bodied unemployed individual receiving any government benefits to perform community service. Why remove such a valuable learning opportunity from all because not all now do it? Instead, make all experience the opportunity and help out the overburdened taxpayer whose funds might have to go to getting performed what can be covered through community service.
Second, if Landrieu was so upset with government bailouts of private industry, why has she supported them? Or at the very least, why did she not offer amendments to make community service part of the arrangement, where if somebody got payment from a firm that took bailout money then it had to be performed? Or, if she’s upset at payments that went to people in bailed out companies, why didn’t she offer an amendment to prevent that? She should be upset at her own lack of foresight and laziness, instead of at a reasonable and valuable request.
Third, performing community service for receiving free government housing while not working despite ability to do so is a different matter than government money being used to compensate somebody for contributions they have made to society – contributions probably far in excess of those by the able-bodied laying around taxpayer-supported housing. The economic contributor has earned it in some fashion, while the former has done nothing to do so. And if somebody is either or both truly unmotivated to go get work and/or whose skills are so marginal that they can’t perform any meaningful work, or someone who had a run of bad luck to trigger unemployment, the gift they receive from those who contribute is reasonably acknowledged through a community service requirement.
Not being the sharpest tool in the shed, Landrieu may not have figured out all of this. Or maybe she thought it was time to shore up her liberal base; maybe both. Regardless, it shows the more sensible Landrieu on the health care debate is more the aberration from the liberal partisan Landrieu than the reverse.
wow. this one of the most stunningly idiotic posts i have read anywhere in some time. if the post did not make it stunningly obvious you have no interest in actual arguments, i would happily respond to your three points. as it is, any time spent would be wasted. you sir, are a partisan hack.
ReplyDeleteNo Wheeler, you give Sadow too much credit. He's just an idiot.
ReplyDeleteAh, the cretins have arrived. Anonymous has no answer so resorts to name-calling, frustrated with inability to produce an effective counter, while Wheeler claims he does, likely bluffing that he has some kind of answers. Time to put your money where your mouth is, give it your best shot: (1) why should not able-bodied, unemcumbered folks give a little back to the community for the gifts they receive, (2) why has Landrieu voted for and voiced support for the government spending bills both of 2008 and 2009 without adding components that require community service, and (3) why should an extra requirement be placed upon people who have contributed to society just because governemnt picks up the contratual obligation to pay? We await your eloquence and brilliance ....
ReplyDeleteJeff you must be on smack. Public housing is not free. They pay varying rates of rent.
ReplyDeleteAnd dude, seriously, nobody except 90 year old latin teachers still use the word cretin.
1.) Landrieu asks that question herself. The 'gifts' the poor receive from the government (i.e. shitty housing) are far dwarfed by the largess bestowed upon much of the 'productive' (i.e. got our economy into this big fucking mess) members of society.
ReplyDelete2.) Landrieu voted against the bail-out, but nice try with your slight of hand, insinuating that she says one thing, and does another. (Good try with the 'at the very least' bit...)
3.) As Landrieu herself notes in her speech, the poor whom this bill was aimed at do not receive "free government housing." They are required to pay 1/3 of their income in rent.
If you want to debate government handouts and wasteful spending, let's talk about all the taxpayer money being wasted on the embarrassing drivel you produce on a daily basis. Lucky for you the Internet isn't peer-reviewed.
>Public housing is not free. They pay varying rates of rent.
ReplyDeleteIt depends on whether you are in Section 8, size of family, income, etc. It's all the way from 0 to a certain percentage.
>The 'gifts' the poor receive from the government (i.e. shitty housing) are far dwarfed by the largess bestowed upon much of the 'productive' (i.e. got our economy into this big fucking mess) members of society.
You dodged the question and clearly do not understand how the world works. If you work, you contribute to society and are compensated on the basis of that in a free market. If you don't, you aren't. Yet welfare gives you benefits anyway. Presumably, the "bailout" is not supposed to be a gift, and it goes to corporations, not people anyway. Thus, it is earned by working people who contribute. That is not the case with those who don't work.
>Landrieu voted against the bail-out.
Check on all of them (amendments etc.). But one thing you won't find is any action on her part for community service for employees of bailout recipients. But that still dodges the point. Just because some don't have to do it doesn't mean others who deserve to be held to this standard also may avoid it.
>They are required to pay 1/3 of their income in rent.
Wow, wish I could get by with the government chipping in 2/3's of my note and requiring nothing else from me -- and I work for a living. I don't think asking 8 hours a month is too much compensation for that for those who don't work.
>let's talk about all the taxpayer money being wasted on the embarrassing drivel you produce on a daily basis.
Money obviously well spent, you'd discover if you'd take my classes. An education it appears you badly need.
> It depends on whether you are in Section 8, size of family, income, etc. It's all the way from 0 to a certain percentage.
ReplyDeleteGlad we can agree that you lied about the amendment requiring community service to be performed for "receiving free government housing," since it would obviously apply to those who pay for their housing.
> You dodged the question and clearly do not understand how the world works. If you work, you contribute to society and are compensated on the basis of that in a free market. If you don't, you aren't.
Convenient how you imply every person living in subsidized housing is unemployed. A common slight of hand for the disingenuous (or a common mistake among the weak-minded... take your pick.)
Low-income housing is available to only those with stable income. In very few areas can those who are employable (that is, not disabled or old) qualify for federally subsidized housing, and not work. In most places, tenants are required to work a minimum number of hours per week (often 30.) Needless to say, if you have a statistic detailing how many people that live in subsidized housing are truly unemployed, I'd love to see it.
> But that still dodges the point. Just because some don't have to do it doesn't mean others who deserve to be held to this standard also may avoid it.
Umm, that is actually kind of the point. 'Just because we put a burden on one sub-group that could just as easily be applied to another sub-group, doesn't mean that there's any reason we should suspect the motives of those putting the burden on that first subgroup!'
It is the same selective justice ethos that allows David Vitter to target the families of criminals while he himself is surely a criminal!
> Wow, wish I could get by with the government chipping in 2/3's of my note and requiring nothing else from me -- and I work for a living.
Again, glad we can agree that those lazy poors aren't always getting the free ride that you claimed they were, which was my original point. There's a difference between "those that don't work" and "those that live in public housing."
> Money obviously well spent, you'd discover if you'd take my classes. An education it appears you badly need.
Thanks for the tip. I will weigh it against the equally attractive option of getting a lobotomy... a procedure that would likely produce the same result, but in a much shorter period of time.
>Glad we can agree that you lied about the amendment requiring community service to be performed for "receiving free government housing,"
ReplyDeleteThis is what's called a "straw man argument" -- saying your opponent said one thing when he really didn't. There are people who live for free in government housing. It's not a large proportion, but they are there -- one worked with my wife.
>Low-income housing is available to only those with stable income. In very few areas can those who are employable (that is, not disabled or old) qualify for federally subsidized housing, and not work.
And thank you for proving my point and veracity of the posting.
>>But that still dodges the point. Just because some don't have to do it doesn't mean others who deserve to be held to this standard also may avoid it.
>Umm, that is actually kind of the point.
It escapes everybody else in the world save you. The proper policy response would be to expand the extra burden onto those who are geting a benefit despite contributing, even as there is no justification for doing so precisely because they have contributed, instead of removing the burden from those who have done nothing in exchange for the benefit.
>It is the same selective justice ethos that allows David Vitter to target the families of criminals while he himself is surely a criminal!
And give me the docket number of the case in which he was convicted of a crime?
>Again, glad we can agree that those lazy poors aren't always getting the free ride that you claimed they were, which was my original point.
See above concerning straw man argumentation. And do point out where I wrote that all people in public housing are unemployed and/or get free housing. Oh, you can't? Imagine that ...
>Thanks for the tip. I will weigh it against the equally attractive option of getting a lobotomy ...
Ah, ignorance is bliss ....