"Independent"

[tobetrained]

@tallslenderguy So to start with an answer to your Qs, first consider the above thought experiment -- typical in philosophy, economic, and political science. What did you do in thinking about that?  The only (simple) answer is to do absolutely NOTHING with the offered gold but stick in room/box and tell no one.

Answer: Even at that high volume of $, you can never help everybody. Let's say you cash it in and dole it out to people and groups you think are worthwhile, there will always be others you've missed or can't get to. But you've now flooded the gold market and devalued it. You get back to a fraction of the original (supply/demand -- markets, not capitalism). That then undermines all world currencies, which begin to collapse, as they're foundation is stores of gold. That, then, triggers global 'systems collapse' (search on that phrase).

Society is 'a system' and systems need to be as self-sustaining as possible either independently or in groups. The human body is a great example of inter-related systems to provide an analogy...simply: it's better not to need a ventilator to breathe than to need one. Most times, government programs are the ventilator.

UHC is a great example but let's only consider one of many aspects for sanity. And, with it, only the 48 contiguous states. A construct to understand one issue with UHC is population density via OMB/Census Bureau defined Urban Areas ("Places" with minimum 5k+ population or 2k+ Household; I'm using caps here to imply a defined term). 80% of our population live in Urban Areas but those cover only 3% of our land area. It's easier to provide UHC (or ANY service) in densely populated places...but a government program can't be selective. So everyone would be required to pay the same by increased personal taxes and/or increased consumer prices as corporate taxes get passed along. But rural populations always get less -- and that's OK if they're not required to pay for services they can't really use.

And this is where partisans, Democrats here but both sides across issues, stop considering other people. The 20% outside Urban Areas makes up ~30%+ of Republican voters. What's in it for them? And the cutoff of 5k people is a arbitrary thing. It's not like a city of 7,500 people is a glowing megalopolis.

But I don't want to answer your Qs purely from a UHC perspective. It's just illustrative. Government isn't a system, people are systems and the society we put together. Government programs are ventilators. They try to fix a problem but, like a ventilator, it shouldn't be permanent. At minimum government programs should not create more problems, like increased debt. I won't get into that here.

But, as a centrist, I will consider any program -- even a program I dislike -- if it's paid for. I will ignore any program which is not, even if I like it. It's hard to consider Democrats viable after their spending plans in the 2020 primary -- where multiple candidates funded multiple proposals from the same increased revenue stream, mainly on the progressive wing. And the few times they were called out for it, the reply: "it's not the plan, it's the idea." No. I can sit here and say no one should have to work so they can play all day long! That idea is great. But it's bogus.

But consider your Q, simplified here, "what should a government provide." That's sorta a Democratic perspective -- "what can government do?" I look at that this way: "How can government help the most yet be involved the least?" I'm looking for a balance. Think ACA. It's about paying for private healthcare. It's not government-run or facilitated healthcare. Principally, that's balance. Opposite side example, to demonstrate this from convos with conservative/libertarian friends, I argue: "Financial market regulation is an absolute necessity due to greed and market manipulation." But those convos don't happen on this site! I'd say it there if they occurred. 

But this is way too long. I'll leave it there but happy to have a conversation about issues, topics, etc around it, or anything.

[tallslenderguy]

22 hours ago, tobetrained said:

@tallslenderguy Conversations are never a problem. I had been responding to you videos for same reason and purpose. Equally, there a lot to unpack in your Qs. Let me figure out to write a compact reply but touch on as much as I can.

But, here's a really interest thought experiment which demonstrates the basis for the above response, I've updated the $ to approx. current prices:

Let's say you were given $100 trillion in gold (4x current tradable volume). You can't keep it for yourself or those you know. What would you do with it?

But don't cheat and use AI! 😃

i have not read your response yet... so here goes.

my initial (and continuing) thoughts and feelings to this question is to feel 99% inadequate to the task of answering. IOW, IDK, and any other answer seems presumptuous. my own particular moral code includes a primary idea that violating another's autonomy ranks up there as a top guiding principle.  Though, intuitively, giving away money for a 'good' cause feels like a 'good' gesture on the surface... but, i'm back to worries of presumption.  

When my sons were teens, i posed a sorta similar question to them (and me) on the topic of love: "Is it love to give a child chocolate cake for breakfast because they want it?"  i think the answers to this kind of question reveals more about the person answering than it actually does to answer the question?   (aside: your question also makes me feel vulnerable lol). At that point, i was trying to help them see that there isn't a universal answer to the question.  If they answered no, objecting about health considerations i'd insert, what it the child was dying and only had a week to live? An intro to situational ethics. 

But,  $100 trillion is not a piece of cake, eh?  Money is power and influence.  i do conclude that one person is ill equipped to handle that amount of power, but there is still no getting around it... well, maybe AI lol. At this point, the democratic process is looking, not so much "good," as it is  potentially more universally considerate.  

i think something i would include as a possible "prime directive" in a democratic process would be the principle that 'I' can be wrong. To me, that is one of the biggest dividing factors in the human race (i.e., the notion that i (and mine)'know' i/we am/are  right and i/we "know" you (and yours) are wrong. 

To me, that introduces (imposes?) grace in the process of decision making, because we all are in the same position of knowing and seeing in part. 

[tobetrained]

@tallslenderguy Wow... so my entry to that question was on the economic side, grossly practical. The exercise I gave myself was breaking costs down -- and damn did I spend a LOT of time back then. A tip of the iceberg was UHC, slightly included in my answer above. The lecturer, to us all was like, "you fools, here's the answer" briefly written at the start of my last post here. Of course, that was the intent on his part.

You took the philosophical route... and it's used there too (like many similar questions).

I think there are similar themes.

1) you said as part of your stated "prime directive" was, "...that 'I' can be wrong..." I think philosophical idea fits into the concept in the economic space that, no matter how much you have, you can make both the wrong decisions, and by helping "over here" you can implicitly hurt "over there."

For instance, the minimum wage increases over the last decade. It does help those getting the increase (esp. initially), but it's also helped to drive up general prices as people trade up, and it definitely creates a separation of those who can't work (temp or perm) reducing the help from other government programs provide (i.e., $0->$8 is a lot less than $0->$15), etc.

Whether you agree with the specific, the connecting idea is that every decision is a trade-off and you can never know the consequences.

2) you said, "grace in the process of decision making" this gets to the actual answer of the question, I think. In that, using a level grace is to accept emotional pain. And, given the answer to the experiment, it's only pain a moral person would feel -- doing nothing.

Curious as to your thoughts after reading the answer.

[tallslenderguy]

3 hours ago, tobetrained said:

@tallslenderguy So to start with an answer to your Qs, first consider the above thought experiment -- typical in philosophy, economic, and political science. What did you do in thinking about that?  The only (simple) answer is to do absolutely NOTHING with the offered gold but stick in room/box and tell no one.

Answer: Even at that high volume of $, you can never help everybody. Let's say you cash it in and dole it out to people and groups you think are worthwhile, there will always be others you've missed or can't get to. But you've now flooded the gold market and devalued it. You get back to a fraction of the original (supply/demand -- markets, not capitalism). That then undermines all world currencies, which begin to collapse, as they're foundation is stores of gold. That, then, triggers global 'systems collapse' (search on that phrase).

Society is 'a system' and systems need to be as self-sustaining as possible either independently or in groups. The human body is a great example of inter-related systems to provide an analogy...simply: it's better not to need a ventilator to breathe than to need one. Most times, government programs are the ventilator.

UHC is a great example but let's only consider one of many aspects for sanity. And, with it, only the 48 contiguous states. A construct to understand one issue with UHC is population density via OMB/Census Bureau defined Urban Areas ("Places" with minimum 5k+ population or 2k+ Household; I'm using caps here to imply a defined term). 80% of our population live in Urban Areas but those cover only 3% of our land area. It's easier to provide UHC (or ANY service) in densely populated places...but a government program can't be selective. So everyone would be required to pay the same by increased personal taxes and/or increased consumer prices as corporate taxes get passed along. But rural populations always get less -- and that's OK if they're not required to pay for services they can't really use.

And this is where partisans, Democrats here but both sides across issues, stop considering other people. The 20% outside Urban Areas makes up ~30%+ of Republican voters. What's in it for them? And the cutoff of 5k people is a arbitrary thing. It's not like a city of 7,500 people is a glowing megalopolis.

But I don't want to answer your Qs purely from a UHC perspective. It's just illustrative. Government isn't a system, people are systems and the society we put together. Government programs are ventilators. They try to fix a problem but, like a ventilator, it shouldn't be permanent. At minimum government programs should not create more problems, like increased debt. I won't get into that here.

But, as a centrist, I will consider any program -- even a program I dislike -- if it's paid for. I will ignore any program which is not, even if I like it. It's hard to consider Democrats viable after their spending plans in the 2020 primary -- where multiple candidates funded multiple proposals from the same increased revenue stream, mainly on the progressive wing. And the few times they were called out for it, the reply: "it's not the plan, it's the idea." No. I can sit here and say no one should have to work so they can play all day long! That idea is great. But it's bogus.

But consider your Q, simplified here, "what should a government provide." That's sorta a Democratic perspective -- "what can government do?" I look at that this way: "How can government help the most yet be involved the least?" I'm looking for a balance. Think ACA. It's about paying for private healthcare. It's not government-run or facilitated healthcare. Principally, that's balance. Opposite side example, to demonstrate this from convos with conservative/libertarian friends, I argue: "Financial market regulation is an absolute necessity due to greed and market manipulation." But those convos don't happen on this site! I'd say it there if they occurred. 

But this is way too long. I'll leave it there but happy to have a conversation about issues, topics, etc around it, or anything.

Haha, you were maybe braver  than me going after the practical/economic side of this question.  Really, we have to go there eventually to answer the question? 

i think with the underpinning principle of "grace" (for lack of a better term? you do seem to get where i'm going with it though). i left a culture of religious absolutism (fundamentalist christianity), so i'm molded by my history, and response to it. In that case their 'trump' was "God," and good luck winning a disagreement with "God."  But i see that same attitude of absolutism everywhere (for instance, i've met more than a few fundamentalist atheists). To me, it's mostly an emotional disposition that creates rationale to support it.  Sorry, seems like i'm getting into the weeds, but i see this as foundational.    As i see it, the notion that i know and you don't removes the opportunity for true debate, because at least one side cannot be engaged (i.e, because they already know the answer/s, so the only think left is for the other to agree or capitulate to the truth.

To me, it comes down to actions born of personal responsibility that derives from "pain only a moral person would feel--doing nothing."  

Your wrote: "Society is 'a system' and systems need to be as self-sustaining as possible either independently or in groups. The human body is a great example of inter-related systems to provide an analogy...simply: it's better not to need a ventilator to breathe than to need one. Most times, government programs are the ventilator."

i'll add to your analogy, maybe break it down further.  If "government programs are the ventilator," then governors/police/judicial etc., are the doctors that decide one needs the ventilator.  And they can be "wrong," inadvertently or by intentional corruption. Of course, we've developed a system to deal with that too, but it always seems to come back to balancing act between trust and grace. It is likely best not to need a ventilator, but our systems all seem to rely (ultimately) on a degree of trust/grace to be self sustaining, and i think that is where things often end up broken(er?) in an already imperfect society.  So, i'm nodding my head at "Financial market regulation is an absolute necessity due to greed and market manipulation," while simultaneously wishing it was a ventilator we didn't need. 

 i find myself wondering if we've not upset homeostasis in how wealth is currently distributed in the US.  In that vein, i appreciate this simplified assessment of division of wealth.  Of particular interest (to me) is a graph he uses throughout his assessment of low, middle and high earners and how all three are increasing income at a similar rate along side the growth of the economy. Towards the end of the analysis, he shows how that has changed (dramatically). 

 

[tobetrained]

20 hours ago, tallslenderguy said:

 i find myself wondering if we've not upset homeostasis in how wealth is currently distributed in the US.

This gets us to a very fun topic. It also gets back to one of your original questions to, re: leadership, which may be a good term to describe those who live with "pain only a moral person would feel--doing nothing..." or, in limitation.

On the topic you bring up, the St Louis Fed posted a tangential document. [think before following links] https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2025/apr/whats-driving-surge-us-corporate-profits

And, to continue beating on the human body as a 'system' analogy, let's go down a diagnosis and prescription road.

The biggest drivers of post-COVID profit have been (point-of-purchase) retail and construction... combining for almost 40% of post-COVID growth of corporate profit of The Fed's selection set. There's a ton to talk about but I'm going focus here on retail -- a large part of which is Amazon. But it replicates across industries in digital consolidation which nationalizes products and services (if not globalizes them). In the case of Amazon, the amount of revenue they have sucked up from 1,000s of local stores which then goes to pay their workforce much higher salaries and [wealth] benefits (stock, 401k, etc.) than those local stores could have offered.

Amazon is one example within this driver of wealth disparity: consolidation of supply and those suppliers' revenue (and profits) shared by their relatively fewer employees. AI is going to be the next. You can add Google, FB/Instagram, etc.

But this brings it back to the bigger question, government's role in the problem. But additionally, how much is our own responsibility of that problem. Companies don't force us to use their products. We live in a free society. But we keep eating the sugar than complain about diabetes. 

Here's where leadership in government comes in, to one of your original questions. Someone open to a government role but also tries to lead people to make better decisions. Should government programs incentivize people to make better decisions or penalizes success. There's much more to be politically gained in the latter. That's poor leadership.

On this specific topic, most Democrats take the latter position while Republicans simply abdicate for fear of government involvement.  

To switch gears a bit, here on environmentalism, I begrudgingly give Warren some credit in the 2020 primaries. She tried to bring up the amount we drive but it fell on deaf ears. Driving is the sugar -- due to direct and indirect environmental impact as well as lifestyle and its part to play on lower life expectancy (people don't walk/exercise enough in daily life).

That last part is so important and missed in our national political discourse, our own role in our own health. This is true not only for the 'systems' analogy we're discussing but the cause and effect in so many other behaviors - health and healthcare, wealth distribution, etc.

On health for healthcare's sake: Here's an interesting excerpt from a book I noted to one of your previous posts, this was specifically to lifestyle and food consumption, re higher age-adjusted life expectancy of Mexican and Latin American women coming to the US vs. white non-Hispanic women in the US:

“...All studies in fact show that immigrants in general are healthier the day they arrive than after five years’ residence in the United States..."
Excerpt From: A Population History of the United States: Second Edition, Herbert S. Klein

To solve any problem, where is the balance between personal choice and government programs? Which should take the lead? 

[Pozzible]

6 hours ago, tobetrained said:

To switch gears a bit, here on environmentalism, I begrudgingly give Warren some credit in the 2020 primaries.

If only. She’s the one who could have led on taxation. When will we learn to elect the woman. Such missed opportunities with Clinton, Warren, and Harris.

[tobetrained]

@Pozzible Re: Warren. Maybe. But these are worth a read if you think so. I dug these out, almost "blast from the past" articles, it's been so long.

[think before following links] https://www.factcheck.org/2019/06/facts-on-warrens-wealth-tax-plan/
[think before following links] https://budgetmodel.wharton.upenn.edu/issues/2021/3/15/budgetary-effects-of-senator-warren-wealth-tax
[think before following links] https://taxfoundation.org/research/all/federal/wealth-tax/

More than any of the details above, none can account for ramifications of the Exit Tax. They assume legality to offer an overall estimate. There's a Constitutionality issue in the U.S. as well as -- more likely -- International Law... but I get that info from a former colleague. No idea on that myself but both are referenced in the top-line assessment online, which also details the 5th Amendment.

Moreover, the Penn analysis updated their model with more feedback effects from their original findings. That is linked above. Like any good academic work, it says a lot without actually saying anything!

@tallslenderguy and all, as this is an open convo, I ref'd making a decision between penalizing success and incentivizing for better outcomes. I do think Warren's falls into the former. But consider this article on same for NYC.

Before you read, as a thought-test, simplify government revenue to personal income tax. What share of revenue should come from the top 1%?

[think before following links] https://www.vitalcitynyc.org/articles/even-mamdanis-new-york-needs-millionaires

After reading, what happens when those people just leave, or the corporations with those jobs hire elsewhere (incl. remote)? This gets to the fear in Warren's plan represented by the Exit Tax, a key element to make the whole thing work. As with others, these are illustrative discussion points, not designed to weed-dive.

[Pozzible]

I only skimmed the first two articles. The third I ignored just due to the organization’s political leanings. If there’s anything that’s particularly negative I missed it. For example, the first section of the factcheck.org article says that “some economists“ doubt that her tax would raise as much as she says. So what?

Maybe the issue of Exit Tax is a concern. But I would have to read about it.  Frankly, if future trillionaire Elon Musk won’t pay more taxes, make him exit. I think we’d do fine without more cybertrucks. (Put 100% tariffs on them.) And since Trump thinks the only good immigrants are white South Africans and extremist Germans, we’ll have plenty of wealthy white South Africans without him. The problem with Musk is that he can hold the US hostage with his control of satellites. How the US allowed someone to have that much control, I can’t understand. As far as I’m concerned, Musk should pay marginal rate of over 90% for anything over $100 billion. (Admittedly, I don’t know what his wealth is vs what he earns). Instead we spend $4 trillion in tax break extensions. Things seemed to work pretty darn well in the 50s when wealthy paid a fair higher share of taxes. 

Were Warren’s ideas ready for prime time? I don’t know, but would be a good starting point. 

Sorry that I’m not going to dig deeper. I have to clean house tonight so that housekeeper can come tomorrow.

[tallslenderguy]

On 11/9/2025 at 10:58 AM, tobetrained said:

On the topic you bring up, the St Louis Fed posted a tangential document. [think before following links] [think before following links] https://www.stlouisfed.org/on-the-economy/2025/apr/whats-driving-surge-us-corporate-profits

 

i brought up more than one topic. Will you be more specific about what you linked this article in response to?

On 11/9/2025 at 10:58 AM, tobetrained said:

But this brings it back to the bigger question, government's role in the problem. But additionally, how much is our own responsibility of that problem. Companies don't force us to use their products. We live in a free society. But we keep eating the sugar than complain about diabetes. 

Here's where leadership in government comes in, to one of your original questions. Someone open to a government role but also tries to lead people to make better decisions. Should government programs incentivize people to make better decisions or penalizes success. There's much more to be politically gained in the latter. That's poor leadership.

On this specific topic, most Democrats take the latter position while Republicans simply abdicate for fear of government involvement.  

To switch gears a bit, here on environmentalism, I begrudgingly give Warren some credit in the 2020 primaries. She tried to bring up the amount we drive but it fell on deaf ears. Driving is the sugar -- due to direct and indirect environmental impact as well as lifestyle and its part to play on lower life expectancy (people don't walk/exercise enough in daily life).

That last part is so important and missed in our national political discourse, our own role in our own health. This is true not only for the 'systems' analogy we're discussing but the cause and effect in so many other behaviors - health and healthcare, wealth distribution, etc.

On health for healthcare's sake: Here's an interesting excerpt from a book I noted to one of your previous posts, this was specifically to lifestyle and food consumption, re higher age-adjusted life expectancy of Mexican and Latin American women coming to the US vs. white non-Hispanic women in the US:

“...All studies in fact show that immigrants in general are healthier the day they arrive than after five years’ residence in the United States..."
Excerpt From: A Population History of the United States: Second Edition, Herbert S. Klein

To solve any problem, where is the balance between personal choice and government programs? Which should take the lead? 

There's a lot here and connected to much of what you've written. It also seems we are coming from very different places, which i think puts broader value on this discussion, but also makes it harder to see the others points as they see them. 

Something i think factors (almost universally?) into this discussion is size. We've only selected a tiny portion of issues, but they're all big. Healthcare is a little more familiar to me because i work in healthcare, front lines. i have 1600 hours taking direct care of Covid+ patients the first two years of the pandemic. i'm also heavily invested in education and professional certifications regarding preventing and intervening in many of the major disease processes that beset western culture because of diet and exercise.  i have a computer folder full of very specific studies on the topic, as well as continuing education.  (bear with me, this is going someplace).  

Some of my patients trust me and my education as an authority. But i don't extend the same trust towards myself or peers, i go another layer and look for evidence. The thing is, before i became a professional, i didn't really understand what constitutes "evidence" like i do now.  We have journals, peer review, professional experience where some can spot and point out flaws in studies. Long story short, "we know and see in part."  So, "grace and trust,"  and questioning always (should?) factor in.  The ability to doubt and always realize and add: "i could be wrong."  One of the things i look for in a 'good' study is "more research is needed."  To me, that's a humble admission that "we know and see in part."  

The process of ideal science tends to spread power and authority out vs concentrating or giving it to one or less people. 

i use healthcare and science as an example because i live it every day and am immersed in it.

But to me, the framework can apply to so many things.  We cannot all be healthcare professionals, so we end up trusting (or thinking we know enough from a youtube or book to accept our own conclusion rather than trusting an authority).  We cannot all be engineers. We cannot all be plumbers, electricians, chefs, presidents, senators, ad infinitum. 

i think there has to be a mix. i educate my patients all the time, especially when it comes to their specific issues. But they still (usually) do not know as much as me or the doctor or the physical therapist or the pharmacist.  And i go to all of these people as well to bolster my understanding of the infinite universe that is the human body.  i often disappoint my patients (emotional) expectation for a panacea by telling them things like: "in medicine, we often kill ants with elephant guns."  Sepsis is an example.  Someone comes into the hospital with the signs and symptoms of sepsis. If we don't intervene, they will typically/statistically die. So, we load them with draw blood first, to help confirm the general diagnosis of sepsis, then give them fluids  and then broad spectrum IV antibiotics.  It's an elegant gun because we know they have an infection, but we do not necessarily know from what. That's one reason we draw blood prior to antibiotics, so we can culture the blood  and know better what we are dealing with. But that takes a day or two for something to grow in a culture, and if we waited to treat until we knew better what we were treating, a lot of people would die. So we hit them with broad spectrum antibiotics, and often find out a couple of days later that one or the other was not even effective. Meanwhile, those antibiotics all have side effects. A major effect we are  learning more about now is killing of beneficial bacteria in our  gut that we live in symbiosis with.

i have a bunch  of  medical examples, but the point is, reality is individually detailed, response is general, collective. 

"Governments role in the problem." 

i think 'we the people' have stepped too far away from government. Or put another way, i think we need to be more involved. To me, it comes down to balance and where we put our individual weight (i.e., time and effort). i can get some education about government and be more engaged. i can get education  about healthcare and be more engaged. i can get more education about business and be more engaged. i can get more education about sports and be more engaged.  You see where i am going with this no doubt, the list is endless and  always involves some degree of trusting others. 

i think our government has potential to be representative, so "governments role" has the potential of being our role. But it will never be perfect because "we the people" are diverse individuals with diverse wants and needs. So, we end up having to kill ants with elephant guns. 

i like to work at a teaching hospital professionally, and go to a teaching hospital when sick because i'm always going to get a group of doctors looking at my patients or me vs just one authority.  It's not a perfect comparison, but i would rather live in a democratic system than a more dictatorial one where one persuasion  calls all the shots. 

To me, done 'right,' "government role" in a representative context is we the people collectively doing things like addressing the problems of defense, general welfare. 

As an individual, i can ride a bike, but i still have to ride behind someone's  diesel pick up truck. 

As an individual, i  can not  smoke, but i may have grown up in an era where private money interests used doctors to advertise tobacco and smoking cigarettes as a healthy practice. 

When tobacco was exposed, many  of the tobacco companies bought food manufacturering companies and applied the same principles to processing and engineering 'food' to be addictive by adding sugar, salt and fat... along with a lot of invented ingredient that our bodies are not adapted to. It's a vast topic, i can provide substantiation.  The point i'm making is, size matters. As an individual, it's possible for me to choose from the infinite list of need to know topics that affect my life. Or, we can engage at a macro level and elect a government to "provide for the common defense and promote the general welfare."  

i think governments role in the problem is ever changing with circumstances. i do not see a black or white, simple answer, rather it seems an ongoing question with ever changing answers. 

sorry, this got long, and i know leaves so much out. Vast topic.

 

 

 

[tallslenderguy]

^^ sorry, lots of typos and some autocorrect, and just some left out words, hopefully some of what i'm thinking conveys?^^

[hntnhole]

On 10/31/2025 at 2:51 PM, tobetrained said:

I think this is a Dem tactic as they run so many of the our cities.

That may be the case, however the closer any elected official is (I mean proximity), the more closely they can monitor where the electorate happens to be on any given issue.  This would reasonably enable those locally-elected Dems to be in close touch with their constituents, which would be a good thing.  

It seems the farther up the food-chain a pol is, the less they tend to be in touch with any local issues in their district.  The way to change that isn't all that tough:  have demonstrations, write letters, make phone calls, organize - in other words, do something.  

[hntnhole]

19 hours ago, Pozzible said:

I have to clean house tonight so that housekeeper can come tomorrow.

LOL ..... I thought I was the only one that did that !!!  Plus, the housekeeper is a very "experienced" gay man, knows just about every other gay man in Ft. L.  Usually, we talk politics more than he pretends to clean .... great guy though. 

I make it a point to be doing something else while he cleans the bathroom ...... 

[tobetrained]

@tallslenderguy To regroup, You added the issue of income disparity above. But this is an effect, not a cause. The cause is what I was trying to get to in my last post. Our collective behavior. We make choices everyday about how and where we spend money and time. Over time, those choices have funneled more and more money to fewer and fewer people. I used Amazon as the example, of many.

You quoted me, “Governments role in the problem.” and continued yourself, “I think ‘we the people’ have stepped too far away from government.”

To be sure, as I wasn’t quite clear form your response, I said ‘role in the problem’ and not the Regean-like “…government is problem.”

You state, “but i would rather live in a democratic system than a more dictatorial one where one persuasion calls all the shots.”

I’m not sure who in the US feels differently so I'm not sure what you mean. Generally, people on one side of the political isle always feel left out after they lose an election. And that feeling, coupled with the over-reach I referenced (in the other thread) of the President’s party early in their term is why the President’s party typically loses the mid-term House election, it's been by a 10-1 margin since 1980.

In terms of participation, I think we’re circling similar things..maybe? In the Amazon example I referenced consumer spending choice as part of the cause of income disparity. That is, with the vast sums we spend with them, companies can pay their employees with incrementally large salaries and wealth (stock options, 401k benefits, etc).

We can participate is so many things EVERY DAY with our own choices – that’s participation too. Examples: buy local products or at least just from local/regional stores/chains (reduce income disparity and rebuild local communities) and take fewer air travel trips while also driving less (environmentalism). Most people choose not to bother, even those who claim to care about those issues.

So there’s an open question: if we are ”the system” (in the on-going example) shouldn’t the first effort to fix a problem come from ourselves?

I’ll leave this part here and let me know if I understood you correctly. I think there’s still more on your point re: participation. I’m not sure I got your point right.

And @hntnhole for Pete’s comment, I was referring to him deflecting a question with “leave it to the municipalities.” It’s a new thing I’ve heard recently from multiple Dem politicians and is the same  ”leave it to the state” or “State’s rights” Republican deflection. I’m unsure how you interpreted my comment by your reply.