Comments On: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals by Eli Sanders http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2012/12/13/why-states-rights-are-good-for-liberals Comments On: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals by Eli Sanders en-us Copyright 2013 The Stranger. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, The Stranger readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact The Stranger. webmaster@thestranger.com (The Stranger Webmaster) Thu, 23 May 2013 00:00:01 -0700 Thu, 23 May 2013 09:45:00 -0700 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
I leave it as an exercise of the reader to figure out which one is which here.

Posted by litlnemo]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 19:20:09 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Fuck the feds, their over reaching laws, their foreign wars,and the coal trains they plan to send through out fair city.

@33
Totes!
Posted by Cascadian Bacon]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 15:47:58 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
From the group you've chosen to argue against, you'd apparently be happier supplying free transit rides on ice floes.
Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 15:23:53 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
I understand WHY this comes off like a good reason for states rights arguments, but I completely disagree for many of the same reasons already mentioned: I'm not a fan of "So long as I've got mine, I could care less what everyone else's situation is like," I don't want to have to make civil rights concessions when travelling or moving from one state to another, and I don't support ideologies that allow for systematic discrimination based on race, gender, sexual orientation, age, religious affiliation, immigration status, ethnicity, etc.

I voted to legalize marijuana so that we could begin a federal discussion about our drug policies; whether the law gets blocked or not, I could care less, it won't change my habits. I want a national discussion regarding drug policy, our failings, and proper solutions (Federal decriminalization/legalization). That's exactly what we've done in WA and CO. I didn't vote for legalization so I could say to other states, "don't like it being illegal there? Then move."
Posted by Bored@School]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 15:01:05 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Tried? You mean succeeded. They've mostly still got the New Deal and Great Society programs that urban liberals bestowed on the country folk. Except for what Bill Clinton took away. They still have desegregation. Overall worked out pretty well.

And now we're just going to give up?

Also, I have far more affinity to the urbanites of Missouri or Alabama than I do for the rural idiots of Washington. My people are actually spread all through every state, in the cities. If I wanted to say "good riddance" to anybody, it would include the country yokels of Washington as much as the country yokels of Texas.

But if I'm going to have to live and make compromises in a half rural state, might as well do it in a half rural country. Either way, my privileged status means I'll do well regardless. Either way, I'm forcing social justice on people who claim not to want it. Though I know the minorities in their midst don't see that way.
Posted by Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 15:00:32 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> $12k over the poverty line, not total income.

And I wouldn't deny them anything. I'm an advocate for free transit. But if we're going to charge fares and are choosing groups to give discounts to, I'll choose the poor.

You're denying a 50 cent discount (ok, really $1.25, per direction) to someone that's in poverty, in order to give it to someone making $12k more than them a year. Or actually, the poorest third of those makes $12k more per year than someone in poverty.

I fully support taking cookies from the billionaire to feed everyone. But you're taking cookie from the guy that's starving and feeding it to the mostly well fed old lady.
Posted by Matt the Engineer]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:56:37 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Which means they're not living high off the hog to begin with, since the average Social Security benefit is $1,000 a month.

"One of every three Americans over 65 depends on Social Security checks to stay above the poverty line. Without these benefits, the poverty rate among seniors would soar from the current 9 percent to 45 percent. The average monthly Social Security benefit for a retired worker was about $1,230 at the beginning of 2012, and the official poverty line for an individual over 65 is $10,788 annually."

But you're so miserly, you'd deny a 50 cent discount on a bus trip to someone trying to live on $12,000 a year, well there are no words...
http://www.facethefactsusa.org/facts/all…
Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:22:29 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> Posted by carsten coolage]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:16:32 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
The old biddy is riding a bus, for Christ's sake, not asking for half off to gas up a Porsche.

There are other discounts for bus fare that aren't means tested, either: for children under 7, no matter how wealthy their parents, for school children (even if they attend private schools), for college students (even if they attend Harvard), the disabled (even disabled millionaires, if they should care to ride the bus), the commuter who buys a monthly pass (no matter if he's a CEO busing it), and so on and so forth.

Cut it out with the invidious, false comparisons, you're fooling next to no one.


Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:12:07 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
"A Conservative, a billionaire, a senior citizen, and a child are seated at a table with a dozen cookies.

The Conservative gives eleven cookies to the billionaire and says to the child, "That old bastard wants half of your cookie!"
Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 14:02:58 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/co…

I'll echo some of the other commenters here by noting that @3 was not saying that the transit system should rob the elderly; only that a blanket policy to discount fares nationwide, regardless of income level, regardless of whether a particular elderly person is still working doesn't help to combat the issue of helping the poor. Even using a rate of 15% of elderly people living in poverty, 100% of them are able to receive a benefit that they may not need. The chart I linked to indicates a rate of 8.9%.

Examining the age structure of the US:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographic…

When you examine 8.9 percent (impoverished) of 12.8 percent (all elderly people in the US) of the population you end up with about 3.5 million elderly living in poverty.

When you look at how many non-elderly are living in poverty, it's 42.8 million people (roughly, the age groups didn't align perfectly). There are more non-elderly poor than their are ALL elderly people.

I'm not saying that the elderly shouldn't receive discounted fares, but I don't think that simply making mention that the blanket policy does little to help the impoverished by focusing on only elderly people warrants being called an asshole, multiple times.

I obviously understand there are other programs that help the poor with discounted bus fares; but the example used by @3 was to highlight the difficulty municipalities run into setting their own rates do to a federal law governing discounted fares for the elderly.

I personally believe that elderly people deserve discounts, they've worked their ass off their whole life (presumably) and should be able to enjoy what little time they may have left with what little money they may have left.

Finally, and honestly, @judybrowni, you're 62; enough with the name-calling.
Posted by Bored@School]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 13:56:30 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
If you'd bothered to read the story I link (or the sections I bolded) to, you'd see these are the latest numbers from the census bureau, and the relative benefits of the expansions of aid to seniors has stalled.

I've never denied tthat there are children in poverty: but that's no reason to deny the elderly, as well.

There are no senior citizens prowling the streets to snatch bottles from babies, so cut out the false, and invidious comparisons.
Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 13:54:32 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Yes, these numbers are increasing, and that's worrying; but they are also still half of the rates for the poorest children.

And benefits for the elderly are not being cut; on the contrary they've been constantly expanded, most notably in 2003 with Bush's prescription drug plan. There is no prescription drug plan for poor children -- let alone all children, as the Bush plan serves all older people.

Children also don't have the largest, richest, and most powerful lobby in America working for them: AARP. Your argument in fact characterizes the AARP position perfectly: attempting to rationalize the provision of benefits to elderly people is "forcing grandma to eat cat food". But if grandma is rich, why should she receive benefits?

While there are many poor elderly in America, there are even more rich ones; on average the richest Americans are in their 50s and 60s, with wealth decreasing slightly amongst older people as they spend down their retirement.

Nearly all additional wealth created in the USA since 1989 has gone to people 55 and older, according to Federal Reserve data. Wealth has doubled since 1989 in households headed by older Americans.

Not so for younger Americans. Households headed by people in their 20s, 30s and 40s have barely kept up with inflation or have fallen behind since 1989. People 35 to 50 actually have lost wealth since 1989 after adjusting for inflation, Fed data show.


http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nati…

Note that I've been talking only about children in poverty, and haven't even touched on the astronomical levels of student debt that virtually all young people face today, if they are expecting to have decent jobs requiring college -- debt that no elderly person faced (another government benefit that has been withdrawn from the young).

For the record, Matt the Engineer is the farthest thing from an asshole imaginable. He was injecting a little bit of reality in this discussion. It is undeniable that rich elderly Americans receive vast amounts of government subsidy that would more sensibly be directed at the genuine poor -- both young AND old.
Posted by Fnarf]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 13:38:29 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> Posted by Matt the Engineer]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 13:28:15 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Also, he/she really sounds like an engineer, trying to make a general point about society but not having the sense to pick an example that doesn't make them look like a cold asshole. My brother is an engineer and he says seemingly asshole things like this all the time, but he votes in a caring way. Sometimes though he can be insufferable when he cops an attitude like everything that comes out of his mouth is as rational and value free as Mr. Spock, when in fact he is just as socially and culturally conditioned as any other average person. On the other hand, of course, lots of engineers are intolerable libertarian assholes.
Posted by cracked]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 13:04:31 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> Posted by beef rallard]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:50:33 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Posted by beef rallard]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:49:11 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
I'm rich enough that I don't benefit from any social welfare services. I support them because I care about other people, and want to live in a just society. (I want the poor to stay fresh and healthy to feed them to great Cthulhu, natch.)

So why would I settle for good social programs only in my state and not let it bother me that I'm letting people in need in other states go to hell?

If my attitude were "I've got mine, fuck you", then I'd be a Republican clamoring for my tax cut.
Posted by Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:20:39 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> Elderly Poverty Jumps According To Census Bureau

once medical care and other costs of living are factored in, the number of people 65 and older living in poverty jumps to 16.1 percent,

...The official poverty rate for all groups rose in 2009 to 14.3 percent

What the numbers show is that rather than Social Security benefits being too generous, they are too meager to keep one in six old folks out of poverty.

..."Our rolls are swelling. There are more and more people on our rolls, there are more and more people in need of our services," said Enid Borden, CEO of the Meals on Wheels Association of America, which delivers meals every day to a million people over 60. "The other side these numbers don't tell is the fact that seniors in this country are going hungry. How can we let that happen?"

...benefits have plateaued and the reduction of the poverty rate stalled out. Engelhardt and Gruber calculated that every ten percent decline in benefits would lead to a 7.3 percent increase in elderly poverty.

..Yet cuts are on the table, despite the robust state of the program's finances, which can cover full benefits through 2037 and boasts a surplus trust fund of $2.6 trillion as of this fall.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/13…

Keep up the Scrooge act, and in time, you too can dine on cat food.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/01/13…


Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:15:15 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Note also that children growing up in poverty are very unlikely to be "earning more income" in the coming decades. In fact, most of them are unlikely to hold living-wage jobs for any length of time at all.

Your family's situation is unfortunate, but I don't think you grasp the precariousness of the real poor in the US -- particularly people of color (35% of black children live in poverty; perhaps twice that percentage in low-income families).
Posted by Fnarf]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:09:47 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> much lower than that of children."

Fourteen million American children live in families with incomes below the federal poverty level, which is $22,050 a year for a family of four. The number of children living in poverty increased by 21 percent between 2000 and 2008 [...] Forty-one percent of the nation’s children – more than 29 million in 2008 – live in low-income families."
Posted by Fnarf]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:00:44 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
Again, unlike younger age groups, without any decades in which they can earn more income.

My 89 year old father, for instance -- with both Medicare and a supplemental policy he pays for, nearly driven to bankruptcy, until we got him signed up for V.A. health benefits.

Just another greedy almst 90 year old motherfucker, who should have gone out and gotten himself a job, I guess.


Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 12:00:44 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>

Posted by beef rallard]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 11:57:34 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]>
As for #3, he posted twice his belief that little old ladies should be screwed out of 50 cents or a dollar, along with the lie that they're greedy old bags.

It's that sort "Let Them Eat Catfood" talk that's fueling the battle bots set on cutting Social Security and Medicare which will make his -- and your -- retirement that much more insecure.

Asshole.
Posted by judybrowni]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 11:53:48 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: When States' Rights Are Good for Liberals]]> Posted by Fnarf]]> Thu, 13 Dec 2012 11:52:04 -0800 The Stranger