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Thanks a lot, that was perfect.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:25
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XyloJW posted:She's half-right. It does call for reduced payments to doctors for procedures. Doctors may choose to stop taking Medicaid/Medicare if the insurance companies offer substantially more money. OK, my wife works in this industry(coding and negotiating claims rates) and I know what I'm talking about, Medicare does pay WAY less then other insurances on a lot of these things, so much so that some doctors dont take medicare because its so stingy. HOWEVER, the big insurance companies (read: blue cross blue shield) pay LESS than medicare because they are so big Dr.s cannot afford to not accept that coverage. We have a broken system where the monopolies (loving blue cross) can pay poo poo and Dr.s have to accept it. This is the real problem with our medical system, imho the real solution is a fair single payer system that pays good rates.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:28
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As for welfare moochers, I heard from at least one friend of a friend on facebook as well as an actual friend that they're upset that government assistance money can be used for alcohol and cigarettes. They're both hard-working people who struggle to make ends meet with two jobs and just over the bar so that they don't qualify for government assistance. I wish they'd be more pissed off at not being eligible for government assistance/having such low pay for the amount of time and effort they put into working. 
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Nov 9, 2012 03:31
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Absurd Alhazred posted:As for welfare moochers, I heard from at least one friend of a friend on facebook as well as an actual friend that they're upset that government assistance money can be used for alcohol and cigarettes. They're both hard-working people who struggle to make ends meet with two jobs and just over the bar so that they don't qualify for government assistance. I wish they'd be more pissed off at not being eligible for government assistance/having such low pay for the amount of time and effort they put into working. Govt assistance cannot be used for these things. The argument is that they use the food stamps food food and 'their' money on booze and smokes. Of course thats the argument and not the talking point that filtered down to your friend. EBT do not work on alcohol.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:36
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Bombadilillo posted:Govt assistance cannot be used for these things. The argument is that they use the food stamps food food and 'their' money on booze and smokes. Of course thats the argument and not the talking point that filtered down to your friend. EBT do not work on alcohol. Explain to them that that's what that means--trading food stamps for drugs. Then ask them what to do about it? When they invariably say "take their food stamps away," ask them what to do about the children who did nothing wrong and need those food stamps to eat. If they say "let'em die" call them a monster. If they say "take their kids away" call them the biggest Big Government hypocrite since Joseph Stalin.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:42
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Bombadilillo posted:Govt assistance cannot be used for these things. The argument is that they use the food stamps food food and 'their' money on booze and smokes. Of course thats the argument and not the talking point that filtered down to your friend. EBT do not work on alcohol.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:43
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Absurd Alhazred posted:There is apparently a kind of cash assistance through EBT that can be used to buy cigarettes and alcohol. As in, one of the people I'm talking about sells cigarettes to people who pay for it with EBT cards. This might be the fact that people trade their foodstamps (ebt) for things they cannot buy. There are literally shady entrepreneurs that trade 2$ worth of foodstamps for 1$ worth of dollars to buy things like cigarettes. It is a real life ghetto economy.  capitalism!
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Nov 9, 2012 03:46
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That'd be either disability or TANF, which is very very different than food stamps. If the person thinks they're arguing food stamps, that needs to be cleared up fast, as they're very different programs.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:46
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Bombadilillo posted:Govt assistance cannot be used for these things. The argument is that they use the food stamps food food and 'their' money on booze and smokes. Of course thats the argument and not the talking point that filtered down to your friend. EBT do not work on alcohol. This is particularly specious complaint because of the fact that ~70% of EBT recipients are expected to supplement their EBT spending with their own money on food anyway. Yeah they might spend some of their own money on beer and it's technically possible that removing their SNAP benefits would reduce their beer consumption, but it'd also reduce their ability to contribute to savings, pay down home and car loans and pay for needed medical care or other necessities. The whole point of welfare programs is to ideally help people get out of poverty, and at some point part of escaping poverty means having money available to spend on things other than bare necessities. It's one of the flaws of many programs today that they cut off so sharply as to be detrimental at that tipping point instead of progressively scaling back once people begin to earn more.
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Nov 9, 2012 03:48
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Bombadilillo posted:This might be the fact that people trade their foodstamps (ebt) for things they cannot buy. There are literally shady entrepreneurs that trade 2$ worth of foodstamps for 1$ worth of dollars to buy things like cigarettes. It is a real life ghetto economy. I think he's referring to non-food stamp government money, such as TANF, that is also used by the EBT card. These funds are generally not restricted. But hey! Good news! Obama has addressed this loophole, and merchants can now report when people buy stupid poo poo like 10 t-bone steaks with EBT cards. http://www.goodwill.org/get-involved/advocate/new-tanf-provision-to-address-ebt-card-abuse-draws-praise-raises-concerns/ quote:For example, an investigation conducted by the Los Angeles Times last year found that $1.8 million in TANF funds were withdrawn in casinos. [...] Seriously, bring this up. Tell them Obama signed a law in March 2012 to address that very loving problem. Tell them to thank Obama for fixing it. E:Tell them "You know, you're right. that is a serious problem. For example [WELFARE QUEENS]. But now Obama has fixed it." XyloJW fucked around with this message at 03:52 on Nov 9, 2012 |
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Nov 9, 2012 03:49
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XyloJW posted:I think he's referring to non-food stamp government money, such as TANF, that is also used by the EBT card. These funds are generally not restricted. That's all good stuff, and I appreciate it, but there's no way in hell I'm conceding welfare queens.
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Nov 9, 2012 04:08
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I work for a newspaper deep in the heart of the most steadfast part of the conservative south. We have a feature where people can anonymously email/call in comments and we run selected ones. In tomorrow's edition, we have someone saying he's moving to Canada. We've been laughing at a) Canada being his beacon of right (and "right") living and b) this section of the country's last two snowfalls were 2011 and 1989 and both were one-day events, including the snow melting. This individual has no idea about Canadian winters.
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Nov 9, 2012 04:45
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Absurd Alhazred posted:That's all good stuff, and I appreciate it, but there's no way in hell I'm conceding welfare queens. poo poo happens, some people abuse the system. So about 2 million was withdrawn in casinos and liquor stores. Big deal, what percentage of the total is that? 2 million seems very low to me. If you concede a little maybe you'll be able to change the way they... Bwahahahaaha!, who am I kidding?
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Nov 9, 2012 04:48
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trucutru posted:poo poo happens, some people abuse the system. So about 2 million was withdrawn in casinos and liquor stores. Big deal, what percentage of the total is that? 2 million seems very low to me. If you concede a little maybe you'll be able to change the way they... Bwahahahaaha!, who am I kidding? Well, the Federal budget spending on "welfare" is about $500,000,000,000, so .000004% of the total budget.
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Nov 9, 2012 06:21
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FCKGW posted:Well, the Federal budget spending on "welfare" is about $500,000,000,000, so .000004% of the total budget. .000004? Don't you mean like 4 percent or .04 percent or something? Edit: Oh. He was referencing 2 million out of that 500,000,000,000 budget. Got it. Kneel Before Zog fucked around with this message at 00:46 on Nov 10, 2012 |
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Nov 9, 2012 07:24
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Kneel Before Zog posted:.000004? Don't you mean like 4 percent or .04 percent or something? He means .000004 of the welfare budget. Or, .0004% of the welfare budget.
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Nov 9, 2012 08:06
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Kneel Before Zog posted:.000004? Don't you mean like 4 percent or .04 percent or something? e:f;b. No love for you, Jerk! 
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Nov 9, 2012 08:19
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Find out if he thinks if it's okay to buy cigarettes or alcohol using money from utilizing the home mortgage interest deduction. Should veterans be allowed to buy alcohol while utilizing the GI bill? Speaking of Casinos, I see a lot of grey hair on the ladies playing slots. Someone ought to notify the government about social security beneficiaries spending their money on entertainment.
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Nov 9, 2012 10:05
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RC and Moon Pie posted:We've been laughing at a) Canada being his beacon of right (and "right") living and b) this section of the country's last two snowfalls were 2011 and 1989 and both were one-day events, including the snow melting. This individual has no idea about Canadian winters.
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Nov 9, 2012 10:37
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Je suis fatigue posted:Eh, winters are colder more than they are white. That said, there was a lot of that on Twitter on election night, "america is doomed, I'm moving to canada" and it's like, for what? Universal healthcare and gay marriage? Pâté chinois, Poutine and Tim Hortons. (Also, the president is better).
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Nov 9, 2012 14:02
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Absurd Alhazred posted:That's all good stuff, and I appreciate it, but there's no way in hell I'm conceding welfare queens. Uh, but I just gave you concrete evidence they exist? Are you going to deny something because it doesn't fit in with your worldview? It's much better to simply accept that they exist, but at such a staggeringly low rate that forming an argument against that should be incredibly easy, especially since doing so won't involve calling your opponent a liar when he talks about welfare queens. Try asking "Can you ever eliminate all crime or fraud?" Then "What is an acceptable level of fraud?" I highly doubt they'll go as low as 4 thousandths of a percent.
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Nov 9, 2012 14:11
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Also, it should be pointed out that those figures are for cash withdrawn from ATMs at Casinos (which is any place that has any sort of gaming, not just giant Las Vegas Casinos), Liquor stores, and strip clubs. Not food stamps used to gamble or buy lap dances. The reason the distinction is important is because not everyone lives in a nice little middle class suburb where the nearest ATM is down the street at the local Wells Fargo branch. And some of these people could be drawing out disability payments. Are they honestly saying that wounded soldiers, or coal miners injured in a mine, don't deserve to get a lap dance or vodka? And since TANF requires employment, some of those withdrawls could be from employees like part time janitorial staff or cashiers. Just because the money was taken out there, doesn't mean it was spent there. But perhaps most importantly, last I checked, dollar bills aren't particularly heavy. Even if you ban withdrawing from those locations, as some conservatives have pushed for, I am pretty sure they could still manage to carry cash from another ATM to that casino or whatever. Sometimes it feels like the decision making process goes something like: - Heard limited information about something I don't like: CHECK - Problem is relatively minor, but it got my blood boiling: CHECK - "Common sense" solution imposes further hardships or outright suffering on the poor: CHECK - Solution won't really fix the problem, and will likely just lead me to suggest further action later: CHECK Let's sign this fucker into law!
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Nov 9, 2012 14:36
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XyloJW posted:Uh, but I just gave you concrete evidence they exist? Are you going to deny something because it doesn't fit in with your worldview? They will definitely respond 'zero' to that last question. It's the same thing with 'voter fraud' where you ask if they're okay with disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of people to stop thirty cases of fraud and they say 'no fraud is acceptable' and shift focus to why lazy people should just get id.
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Nov 9, 2012 15:16
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Sarion posted:Also, it should be pointed out that those figures are for cash withdrawn from ATMs at Casinos (which is any place that has any sort of gaming, not just giant Las Vegas Casinos), Liquor stores, and strip clubs. Not food stamps used to gamble or buy lap dances. The reason the distinction is important is because not everyone lives in a nice little middle class suburb where the nearest ATM is down the street at the local Wells Fargo branch. And some of these people could be drawing out disability payments. Are they honestly saying that wounded soldiers, or coal miners injured in a mine, don't deserve to get a lap dance or vodka? And since TANF requires employment, some of those withdrawls could be from employees like part time janitorial staff or cashiers. Just because the money was taken out there, doesn't mean it was spent there. But perhaps most importantly, last I checked, dollar bills aren't particularly heavy. Even if you ban withdrawing from those locations, as some conservatives have pushed for, I am pretty sure they could still manage to carry cash from another ATM to that casino or whatever. I'll accept all those arguments, but a conservative who hates welfare queens won't. They'll say that at most a tiny tiny fraction of all those withdrawals were from wounded soldier miners who live a hundred miles from the nearest ATM, and the rest were all welfare queens with their bumpin' escalades and 15 children. The best response, I feel, is "What do you want us to do?" Gourd of Taste posted:They will definitely respond 'zero' to that last question. It's the same thing with 'voter fraud' where you ask if they're okay with disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of people to stop thirty cases of fraud and they say 'no fraud is acceptable' and shift focus to why lazy people should just get id. I agree that it is the same argument I use for voter fraud, and I've found it's effective, if you preface it with "Can you ever eliminate all fraud?" If you get them to admit that it's utterly unreasonable to think they can prevent all fraud or crime, no matter how tight and restrictive the laws, then they'll be more willing to accept that, yeah, I guess we already do everything we can. Point out how cost-ineffective drug testing has been in Florida--that they've wasted more money on testing than they've saved by kicking off the drug users. Argue from where they're comfortable--small government, fiscally conservative, tough on crime. They're still wrong, even by their own standards.
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Nov 9, 2012 16:12
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Gourd of Taste posted:They will definitely respond 'zero' to that last question. It's the same thing with 'voter fraud' where you ask if they're okay with disenfranchising hundreds of thousands of people to stop thirty cases of fraud and they say 'no fraud is acceptable' and shift focus to why lazy people should just get id. Tell them you would like to apply this logic to gun control.
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Nov 9, 2012 16:15
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FCKGW posted:Well, the Federal budget spending on "welfare" is about $500,000,000,000, so .000004% of the total budget. Your overall point is correct but this a bit misleading since at $500 billion you're including massive expenses like Medicaid and such where people don't have access to direct funds. Overall though it's still miniscule 27% of TANF's $33 billion in expenses was spent on direct cash assistance http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=936 so it's still below a fraction of one percent. Meanwhile, the $70 billion food stamp program has an overpayment rate of just over 2% http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3239 Somehow I have a feeling there's probably more fraud on the books of our glorious free market overlords than there is in government programs.
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Nov 9, 2012 16:54
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Amused to Death posted:Somehow I have a feeling there's probably more fraud on the books of our glorious free market overlords than there is in government programs. You say fraud, I say innovative accounting. 
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Nov 9, 2012 17:51
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XyloJW posted:Uh, but I just gave you concrete evidence they exist? Are you going to deny something because it doesn't fit in with your worldview? You did not give me concrete evidence that people are sitting at home doing nothing and living so well on the government dole that they can afford cigarettes and alcohol, and that their lives would be fine without that government dole if they just up and started working. That's what the welfare queen thing is all about, not somebody taking money out near a casino or using some of their money for cigarettes and alcohol (and maybe worse if they're heroin addicts). What I'm arguing against is people thinking that it would be better if these people didn't get government money. I'm not conceding that, because it's a bad slippery slope. As for your later point about arguing from where they're comfortable.. I'll have to give that some thought. But I still think I can argue that without conceding dangerous things just for the sake of argument, because it is never perceived to be just for the sake of argument.
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Nov 9, 2012 18:45
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Absurd Alhazred posted:You did not give me concrete evidence that people are sitting at home doing nothing and living so well on the government dole that they can afford cigarettes and alcohol, and that their lives would be fine without that government dole if they just up and started working. That's what the welfare queen thing is all about, not somebody taking money out near a casino or using some of their money for cigarettes and alcohol (and maybe worse if they're heroin addicts). What I'm arguing against is people thinking that it would be better if these people didn't get government money. I'm not conceding that, because it's a bad slippery slope. Perhaps I wasn't clear. When I said "[welfare queens]" I didn't mean for you to use that word, because that does carry all those implications you say. What I meant was say "Yeah, here look, here are some cases of real fraud." They exist. People really do sell drugs and having no (or lesser) 'official' income, collect welfare. You'd be a fool if you think it didn't happen. My parents did this. A good friend of mine did this. I don't blame them one bit, because society has ground them up and left them to die. They're doing what they can to survive. But that's miles away from what we're talking about. People who bust out the image of someone being a welfare queen are implying, whether they mean to or not, a course of action. Press them on that course of action, and point out that they don't have a good alternative. Show them that Obama is on their side, and is even now prosecuting those who commit welfare fraud. Pointing out someone's wrong in their own thinking is much easier than trying to brute-force argue them over to your way of thinking. XyloJW fucked around with this message at 20:29 on Nov 9, 2012 |
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Nov 9, 2012 20:24
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Amused to Death posted:Your overall point is correct but this a bit misleading since at $500 billion you're including massive expenses like Medicaid and such where people don't have access to direct funds. Overall though it's still miniscule 27% of TANF's $33 billion in expenses was spent on direct cash assistance Hey, if they're going to use the term "Welfare Queens" instead of "TANF queen", then those are the numbers I'm going to use. And yes my decimal points were way off, sorry.
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Nov 9, 2012 20:31
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Hooray, I finally got someone to say "the blacks are the real racists." A friend sent a map showing the white vote in the 2012 election with a message body of "just sayin'." After my parents had a freakout with him, I sent this:I posted:You posited that had only whites voted, Romney, your perceived superior candidate, would have won. By framing this from a racial perspective, you're implying that you believe other races have inferior opinions—whether you realize that as being racist or not is a different issue. To which he responded: quote:No no no no no no no. " By framing this from a racial perspective, you're implying that you believe other races have inferior opinions" All I did was send a freaking map with the white vote!! How does that imply that I think other race's votes are inferior? Wow. I accept that other people have a different opinion from me. I just find it FUNNY that when you look at the votes by race, the black vote is 97% for obama, and the latino and asian vote over 70%. It is INTERESTING and strange. Actually, it's not that strange when you look at what I wrote in my last email about the left's tactics to make the right look like racists. Imagine if China had a leader that opened its borders up, and soon the Chinese were going to become the minority in that country to hispanics? Wouldn't it be FUNNY, if during a potential election they had, that the majority of the Chinese voted for one guy, and the other won due to the minority vote? 
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Nov 9, 2012 23:00
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I like how he says "they're the real racists" and then goes on to accuse non-white people of not getting what made America great, I guess because agreeing with him is a prerequisite for that. (Also, being romantically involved with a person of another race does not mean you can't be racist. In fact in some cases it can be an expression of problematic attitudes.) But mostly, conservatives are trying any way they can to avoid confronting the possibility that other people rationally looked at the issues and decided the other guy was the better choice.
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Nov 9, 2012 23:18
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Hm yes all those racist black people who voted based on race don't understand what made their ancestors want to come to America, great point.
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Nov 9, 2012 23:35
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Bryter posted:Hm yes all those racist black people who voted based on race don't understand what made their ancestors want to come to America, great point. I don't think anything encapsulates the insanity of that post as this does, holy loving poo poo. Has anyone else been getting facebook lists about companies announcing layoffs in the last 48 hours yet? If not, get ready for that idiocy, because if you get half the stuff I do it'll be all over your feeds. It's actually been a long time since I got a crazy email now, facebook has really taken that over in the last few years.
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Nov 9, 2012 23:45
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From Facebook:  Man it's a good thing Obama lost the popular vote, otherwise this would just be stupid! 
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Nov 10, 2012 00:00
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Blarghalt posted:From Facebook: If you want to actually engage whoever posted that, you can easily hit them with the fact that they've used the wrong map. That's from 2004. EDIT: I'm assuming it's 2004. It looks pretty much like the map that was posted earlier that was the 2004 map. You could tell if it was 2008 or 2012 because there'd be a blue dot in NE Texas representing Dallas County, which has gone for Obama in both presidential elections. thefncrow fucked around with this message at 00:07 on Nov 10, 2012 |
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Nov 10, 2012 00:05
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Also, hit them with this one, pretty sure it's from the same year. 
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Nov 10, 2012 00:11
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If you really want to irritate them, you can also point out that red states are the "
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Nov 10, 2012 00:11
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The other possibility is to use the image from this post, which I'm quoting from the "Is the GOP becoming a rump party?" thread:mdemone posted:This seems like the best place to drop this. I know most of us have seen Mark Newman's cartograms at some point during the election season, but I thought it would be helpful to compile into one image all of the maps that have something interesting to say, now that he has updated the county-by-county data for 2012. That includes the actual county-by-county winner take all map from 2012 while also showing how that looks when you scale for population density and how that looks when you take into account the R/D split instead of just winner-take-all.
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Nov 10, 2012 00:19
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Blarghalt posted:From Facebook:  
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Nov 10, 2012 00:19
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