EPTUS Politics Mega-thread - Page 3570
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Now that we have a new thread, in order to ensure that this thread continues to meet TL standards and follows the proper guidelines, we will be enforcing the rules in the OP more strictly. Be sure to give them a complete and thorough read before posting! NOTE: When providing a source, please provide a very brief summary on what it's about and what purpose it adds to the discussion. The supporting statement should clearly explain why the subject is relevant and needs to be discussed. Please follow this rule especially for tweets. Your supporting statement should always come BEFORE you provide the source. If you have any questions, comments, concern, or feedback regarding the USPMT, then please use this thread: http://www.teamliquid.net/forum/website-feedback/510156-us-politics-thread | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
Plus it doesn't seem like all that VA spending is making our military any better. We're spending all this money on veterans of lost wars. Is that really what our military budget should be for? | ||
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Gorsameth
Netherlands21630 Posts
On March 31 2022 02:53 JimmiC wrote: No one here disagrees that larger changes are needed and that just forgiveness doesn't solve anything for future generations.Ours are not interst free, you do get some forgiven if you graduate and 6 months free after you graduate. The rates on the federal loans I see are not that out of line nor is the payment schedule. It is the size that is the problem. Not to mention if you make it "free" what is to stop all the colleges from charging more and more? Why wouldnt someone in the US take 6 amazing years to get a liberal arts undergrad at the cost of 200k to the tax payer and nothing to them? I doubt the profit driven US colleges are going to now all tge sudden start doing what is best for society. Loan forgiveness without some big time changes in how universities charge and are funded is a huge mistake. Not to mention you are spending huge money on the middle and higher, well fixing nothing that prevented all the people in poverty from attending in tge first place. But those larger changes are not going to happen because it would require congress and giving current loans is something the President can, supposedly, do with the stroke of a pen. Its the old 'we need to do something more but we can't, so lets do something atleast'. | ||
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Sadist
United States7217 Posts
On March 31 2022 02:53 LegalLord wrote: Yeah, the fact that Republicans want to "keep the lights on" by taking care of veterans is commendable, if ultimately misguided for the reasons stated above. I see supporting the VA in its current state to be in the same place, politically, as any of the many "Support the Children Act" policies that are political suicide to be seen opposing despite how utterly broken and purely wasteful they are. Plus it doesn't seem like all that VA spending is making our military any better. We're spending all this money on veterans of lost wars. Is that really what our military budget should be for? Im pretty sure the Republican party is not the party of trying to keep the lights on. I think the implication of his post is they are actively trying to make things worse | ||
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NewSunshine
United States5938 Posts
On March 31 2022 02:53 LegalLord wrote: Plus it doesn't seem like all that VA spending is making our military any better. We're spending all this money on veterans of lost wars. Is that really what our military budget should be for? You're sounding a bit like Trump there. Did you mean we're wasting money that should be going to help veterans? I don't think the outcome of our military involvement, out of any one person's control, should be used to dictate whether we give a shit about them afterward. | ||
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farvacola
United States18824 Posts
On March 31 2022 03:06 NewSunshine wrote: You're sounding a bit like Trump there. Did you mean we're wasting money that should be going to help veterans? I don't think the outcome of our military involvement, out of any one person's control, should be used to dictate whether we give a shit about them afterward. Note that LL hasn't provided a single bit of evidence in support of his apparently strong anti-VA beliefs. The idea that the VA is somehow more bloated or prone to bloating than the military at large should not be taken at face value, especially not from someone who appears to harbor disdain for veterans and children. | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 31 2022 02:59 Sadist wrote: Im pretty sure the Republican party is not the party of trying to keep the lights on. I think the implication of his post is they are actively trying to make things worse If there's a party that's all-in on supporting the VA's office, it sure as hell ain't the Democrats. The implication was noted, but an obvious baseless talking point. That Democrats like to claim the moral high ground even when their actual policy successes show they have very little ground to stand on is a known factor. | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 31 2022 03:06 NewSunshine wrote: You're sounding a bit like Trump there. Did you mean we're wasting money that should be going to help veterans? I don't think the outcome of our military involvement, out of any one person's control, should be used to dictate whether we give a shit about them afterward. What's the point of our military budget if not to support our military capability? Certainly, benefits for former soldiers is a part of ensuring we have an effective recruitment pipeline today, but the military budget is not meant to be an entitlement program per se. Why rack up expenses if we don't derive military benefit from it? Evidently the growth of VA expenditures did not correspond to a greater level of military success, if the last few wars are any indication. | ||
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Sadist
United States7217 Posts
On March 31 2022 03:29 LegalLord wrote: If there's a party that's all-in on supporting the VA's office, it sure as hell ain't the Democrats. The implication was noted, but an obvious baseless talking point. That Democrats like to claim the moral high ground even when their actual policy successes show they have very little ground to stand on is a known factor. You wont need a VA if you have medicare for all. Well all be on the same plan. I agree the VA shouldnt go away without a replacement in place (M4A) | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 31 2022 03:40 Sadist wrote: You wont need a VA if you have medicare for all. Well all be on the same plan. I agree the VA shouldnt go away without a replacement in place (M4A) I mean, if it did go away with no replacement, would it really be that bad? Assume everything remained the same except soldiers were discharged with zero VA benefits. Let's look at the main things that would be impacted. Employment: Better than average prospects because veterans would be mostly young men with technical backgrounds. Plus strong preference for any job in the civil service based on veteran status, so if nothing else you can get a stable job with a fat pension. Housing: Veterans would have to take out a normal mortgage like the rest of us. At least they'd have the money they saved up from service, which would be a nice contribution towards a down payment. Healthcare: Veterans would have to either have a job or pay for it like the rest of us. If they get sick with something really bad, they'd have to pay for it, but that's also the same problem everyone else faces. Education: They'd have to pay for it like the rest of us if they didn't get it as part of their service. Probably going to be better off than average. Disability due to WIA: This one really does kind of suck, but you could still get standard civilian disability. No special soldier's premium for disability in war though. And that's if you did absolutely nothing but just cut the VA wholesale without any mitigating factors. Is that really so bad, when you free up $230B (and rapidly growing - was a fifth of that two decades ago) a year for more important priorities? Better than holding it hostage against M4A, which is about the equivalent of saying "we'll stop wasting money when we achieve world peace." You don't need to solve all of society's problems to cut out the most bloated part of the military budget. Yes, it "sounds bad" and yes, it'll be decried by those who receive rent (in the economic theory sense) from its existence, but the most feel-good sounding things often contain the biggest actual waste. | ||
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NewSunshine
United States5938 Posts
On March 31 2022 03:34 LegalLord wrote: What's the point of our military budget if not to support our military capability? Certainly, benefits for former soldiers is a part of ensuring we have an effective recruitment pipeline today, but the military budget is not meant to be an entitlement program per se. Why rack up expenses if we don't derive military benefit from it? Evidently the growth of VA expenditures did not correspond to a greater level of military success, if the last few wars are any indication. Then you take that up with the waste within the system, rather than asserting the system is useless. If we're willing to put people on the front lines, we damn well better be willing to take some responsibility for what happens to them. Your argument treats the people willing to risk their lives as tools, as you make an argument akin to "who cares about the greenhouse gases, the point of generating energy is to keep the lights on". I don't appreciate how callously you just throw that out there. | ||
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Zambrah
United States7288 Posts
Just because the VA provides not-me with things that I wish I had that doesn’t mean I want the people who do have those things to no longer have them. That’s big time crabs in a bucket mentality. | ||
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Sermokala
United States13867 Posts
I'm pretty sure he's also under the delusion that there really is a "labor shortage" that isn't just corporations refusing to employ people or pay people like they're supposed to be doing because they want to commit fraud and no one will come after them for it. . | ||
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Sadist
United States7217 Posts
Since you are proposing gutting the VA, why not kill medicare, medicaid, social security, and disability while you are at it? Im all for replacing those programs with something better, but you dont boot people that depend on them off without giving something in place. Wtf. | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 31 2022 04:01 NewSunshine wrote: Then you take that up with the waste within the system, rather than asserting the system is useless. If we're willing to put people on the front lines, we damn well better be willing to take some responsibility for what happens to them. Your argument treats the people willing to risk their lives as tools, as you make an argument akin to "who cares about the greenhouse gases, the point of generating energy is to keep the lights on". I don't appreciate how callously you just throw that out there. You've identified the visceral reaction that enables costs to grow without bound - "we can't abandon our veterans." But the reality of the world we live in is we can't do right by everyone everywhere to the maximum extent possible, since we have limited resources, so you have to fight your battles. And veterans are certainly not worthy of being some maximally privileged class for the purpose of welfare benefits; they should get as much as we need to support the continuity of an effective military, and not a penny more. You'll obviously get resistance from the "support our troops" crowd and from people who are veterans who don't want to receive less. but you'll also get widespread protests if you raise the retirement age. Sometimes you gotta do what's best for society at the cost of one group or other, and the VA's office is one of the best places to start precisely because of how much the touchiness of the subject contributes to dysfunction. We do live in a world where you have to make trade-offs. And yes, that does sometimes come off as callous. I would go as far as to say that "we'll have enough for everything if we just eliminate the waste" is a feel-good fantasy itself. | ||
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Zambrah
United States7288 Posts
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 31 2022 04:22 Sadist wrote: Ya. I dont want to kick people off of their healthcare plan. I want us all to have M4A. Since you are proposing gutting the VA, why not kill medicare, medicaid, social security, and disability while you are at it? Im all for replacing those programs with something better, but you dont boot people that depend on them off without giving something in place. Wtf. Not opposed to better overall healthcare as part of the package, but it'd be fine to solve the VA problem before solving the overall healthcare problem. Employer-provided health insurance is always an option for those among us who have to earn for a living. That problem becomes merely the problem everyone else has, which while problematic is indeed the status quo. Not the worst thing that could happen. Medicare, medicaid, and all the other entitlement programs will absolutely have their reckoning sooner rather than later. I don't need to want to kill it to see that we're not just on an unsustainable trajectory but on the precipice of imminent disaster. But talking about that won't garner near as much attention as mentioning the dangerous entitlement outgrowth in the place people try not to look, i.e. in the VA office. Everyone already knows about those other ones. | ||
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Simberto
Germany11470 Posts
Universal healthcare costs fewer tax dollars than the current US healthcare system. Well, any healthcare system in any country outside of the US costs fewer tax dollars than the current US healthcare system. And no, the US is not top in results, see the same report i linked. However, i do agree that the whole VA system in the US is really weird. You shouldn't need to be a soldier before getting the basic rights of a citizen, we are not living in the world of Starship Troopers. | ||
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Godwrath
Spain10121 Posts
On March 31 2022 04:40 Zambrah wrote: Why the VA and not the rich and wealthy though His point is that it's used as the perfect corruption mechanism, you can't remove it since it's morally bankrupt to do so. His main point is to hit the people who are exploiting that status to profit from it (which would be rich). To be honest, I would be more interested to see how bloated it really is rather than take someone's word on it. How many veterans benefit from it. Also, I don't know how he is surprised at the budget increase with failed wars, it actually has logic that after unfruitful long wars, the veterans who might need that kind of help increase, not otherwise. | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On March 31 2022 04:40 Zambrah wrote: Why the VA and not the rich and wealthy though No reason you couldn't do both if you really wanted to. Though interestingly, you could gain a comparable monetary benefit from axing the VA as from a wealth tax, and you'd get the same brand of corporate resistance because the moneyed interests that benefit from the VA are rather overlapping. Raise funds from the wealthy, spend them on something useful (e.g. "building back better" or socialized healthcare) rather than funneling that money into VA or putting it on the debt. We can get a lot of money to work with by taking it from the wealthy, but even if we did that we wouldn't have enough money so it has to come out of somewhere else too. | ||
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