So there is this group…Too Informed to Vote Republican. There is a counterpart for the other side as well…but the TITVR side seems to be more present or perhaps it is just the people I know/groups I follow that are sharing them more. Either way, I was recently presented with another of the bullet point filled, “See! We told you that they are bad” posts extolling how bad the Republicans are and why.
Their first point: “If the free market works so well, why does the government give over $150 billion in corporate welfare?”
This sure sounds awful and certainly the Republicans must be at fault! All corporations and corporate money is controlled by Republicans! So let’s take a step back and look at the claim. Corporate welfare to the tune of $150 billion. OK, what does that mean? We need to define corporate welfare. Normally it is described as any payment, subsidy, or tax break given to a corporation. Sounds straightforward, but is it? This $150 billion includes small business loans to the little guy that is trying to make a go of it, it also includes the tax breaks that some companies get from governments to open facilities in their states. Meaning that when MegaCorp wants to open a new plant, states will offer all sorts of tax incentives and other deals to get those jobs and that factory in their state.
Why are we blaming Republicans for this. Every state has some sort of program and yes, the federal government also plays in. Are there companies on this list that shouldn’t get any subsidy dollars or tax breaks? Absolutely. Nike for example…but how did Nike get on this list? See, when you dig deeper you find out that Phil Knight of Nike donated $250K to Governor of Oregon Phil Kitzhaber and things start smelling sweet for Nike and their taxes…Kitzhaber is a Democrat…so tell me again how this is a fault of the Repubilcans? Are they innocent in all of this? No sir (or ma’am), they aren’t…but they aren’t the only ones running the shell game.
Social Security and Medicare are funded by FICA deductions so why talk of cutting?
Social Security has been borrowed against illegally. It has seen the outgoing funds outweigh the incoming and by 2035, will most likely run out of the “trust fund” that keeps everyone receiving their full benefits. All Republican candidates say they want reform, not removal. But, with the year 2035 potentially seeing people only getting 75% of what they are owed, we need to look at reform before it is too late. Unless everyone wants 75% when they get to that age…if by reform they mean that we can allow people to start voluntarily removing themselves from SS, what is wrong with that? Why can’t I be responsible for my own retirement? Either way, this isn’t only a Republican problem, this is an America problem.
800 military bases worldwide cost us hundreds of billions annually. Also, Germany is the 4th largest economy in the world, why do we have 30 bases there?
Not sure how this is a Republican problem either…there has been a Democrat president for 16 of the last 24 years. Certainly they could have done something. No? Then how would the next president? Exactly…way too many moving parts to pin on one person or party.
But let’s dig deeper into why we have so many bases? There are not 30 bases in Germany, there are 21. We don’t have 800, we have 661. So off the top this is pure exaggeration. We are closing more bases all the time. The big problem is, who checks these things when they read them on facebook or wherever they get their news? This will get spun out into the universe and accepted as fact. I would suggest that as you watch/listen to the news, when you hear someone use this…ahem, “fact”, that you realize that you are listening to someone who doesn’t do their homework and is blindly voicing opinions upon which they don’t have the proper information to base them.
Next, we have these bases not only to protect those countries, but to give us easier access to parts of the world where we may run into trouble. Imagine the Gulf war if we couldn’t launch from Europe or Africa…but instead everything came from here. Now, we can argue whether we should have ever even involved ourselves in that region of the world, but that is a different story. Again, I fail to see how this is a Republican only issue…
Lastly, there is a shortage of doctors in America, yet we don’t lower tuition, we recruit doctors from other countries.
I am sighing as I type this because someone is dragging a net so low in the muck hoping to strike a chord, that they use an opinion as fact and then somehow blame this on the Republican party. How on earth is the cost of medical school a Republican problem. Does the president or congress set the price of tuition? Does Obama call the chancellor at UCLA and tell him his prices are too high?
Of course not, tuitions are set on a school by school basis. Secondly, private colleges are free to set tuition wherever the market will bear, if they need more students, they will drop their costs. If they aren’t reducing costs, they must be getting enough students. Only two state legislatures (Florida and Louisiana) set the tuitions of public colleges, so maybe you could complain in those states…Also, an AA costs average of $9,000. Two more years at state school (in your state of residence) costs an average of $18000 and then your MD is another $50 k for the state school 5 year program. You can get an MD for an average of $77K. That is just a little more than the cost of just your freshman year at Cornell…
It is all in your choices. Anyone going to medical school knows the costs involved. You don’t wake up in the middle of your first year of residency and realize that this was an expensive endeavor.
I have said it before, please don’t accept everything at face value. Hell, you should go and check my facts. The more you know, the better you will feel about the choices you are making. In this day of sound bite news and meme based politics, it is more important than ever to not just blindly trust what you read and hear. You may find out things are very different than you have been led to believe.
EDIT: They did just post a pretty on the spot note about Trump and his inability to accept criticism and his continued negative interaction with the parents of a soldier killed in action. Credit where credit is due…
Above the Nonsense 