[DMCForum] Re: The Constitution Is an Illusion Part II

["ryanpwright" <yahoo1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

--- In DMCForum@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Bob Brandys <BobB@xxxx> wrote:

> Redirect the publics attention from the real social issues in 
> this county- like a living wage and national health care.

Oh, give me a break. Your "living wage" is nothing more than "Let's
raise the minimum wage so high that a single mother working at
McDonalds can raise three children and have a comfortable life." It
sounds so pretty, but you don't think through the problem. Washington
State has one of (if not the?) highest minimum wages in the nation.
It's currently up to $7.15 per hour and will continue to rise yearly.
So what happens?

1. Small businesses with menial labor tasks (janitorial jobs, etc)
have difficulty affording the employees they need.

2. Many businesses make do with less staff, so while you've handed a
free ticket to a bunch of people, you've also put many out of work.

3. Many people will simply decide that minimum wage is more than
enough to live on and won't go to college nor do anything else to
further their education. Many teenagers may just give up on high
school as well - why not, if they can make enough money for a nice car
and a decent apartment?

4. Most businesses that pay minimum wage raise prices to compensate,
so the rest of us - who actually bothered to educate and build a
better life for ourselves - effectively subsidize everyone else. So
not only is my money taken from me without my consent and
redistributed to those deemed "less fortunate", now I get to subsidize
them again every time I go out to eat.

The point of a minimum wage is not to provide a comfortable life. It's
not supposed to be enough to live on - that's the point. It's intended
to be a "learning wage". You work at a fast food place for a few years
to learn basic employment skills, which you then use to find
progressively better jobs. 

Let's measure the cost of your "living wage" to employers. A typical
McDonalds restaurant has an average of 8 employees on staff from 6am
to midnight. When the minimum wage spikes from $5.15 an hour to $7.15
over a period of a few short years, 8 employees * $2/hour * 18 hours *
30 days in a month and one McDonalds restaurant now spends an
additional $8,640 per month. Include the increase in employment taxes
and other such stuff, and this number will exceed $10k.

Can one McDonalds restaurant afford another $10k a month? Maybe, maybe
not. Can your local Mom & Pop business do it? Probably not.

Don't even get me started on national health care. If you want it so
bad, move to Canada, get yourself injured and wind up in an ER. From
what I've heard about Canada's national health care system, you'll
change your mind in a hurry. And don't be so arrogant to think
Americans are smart enough to do it right, because when you screw it
up, you're screwing my family, too. 

> Typical example, the police arrest a teenager for pot
> smoking, the get a search warrant for the parents house, 
> find a joint in the house and then take the families house 
> away from them.

Hey, I'm with you on current drug policy. It's a complete waste of
resources. The large majority of people in our prisons are non-violent
offenders, many of them drug users who never harmed anyone but
themselves. The siezure policy is wrong, wrong, wrong. Many people
spend years in court, eventually win their stuff back, and the
government says, "Oh, sorry. We sold it all. But hey, here's the ten
grand we got for your lakefront home from the DEA officer who seized
it, maybe that will help."

> Right wing politicians are the ones responsible for enacting these 
> laws.

Now you're just lying. How do you come up with this BS? Bill Clinton
was a huge supporter of the war on drugs, as have countless democrats
before him. Here's an example article from CNN:

http://www.cnn.com/US/9802/14/clinton.gingrich.drugs/

Look, as far as I'm concerned both parties are full of no good snakes.
Bush gave us the Patriot Act, a law that allows federal agents to not
only tap your phone, but also the phones of anyone they think you
might ever want to call, all without a warrant. Clinton gave us the
DMCA. Both parties spend billions of our dollars eradicating marijuana
and jailing the people who use it. Marijuana - a crop that could
provide fabric for our clothes and fuel for our cars nearly for free.
The stuff doesn't even need to be taken care of to grow - throw some
seeds on the ground, let the rain water them, and a little while later
you've got a 6 foot tall crop thriving without pesticides or
fertilizers. Why do you think they call it "weed"? 

The laws are completely ineffective. I could get a stash of pot this
afternoon if I wanted it, and I don't hang out with drug users. It's
easily accessible and people smoke it all the time. And why not - it's
nowhere near as dangerous as alcohol, yet that remains legal.
Meanwhile we spend all of this money and divert police resources into
busting non-violent pot smokers. Crap, the worst thing you have to
fear from a pot head is that he'll eat your whole bag of Fritos. Yeah,
sounds like someone who needs to be jailed to me...

-Ryan

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