Politics Thread

[xu82]

Yep. You still need the degree to get most good jobs though, so you are kind of screwed. It's the definition of a racket.

There are cost effective ways of doing it, but it requires some effort. I have a buddy who is now a Director at a big local company in his early 40's, so fairly successful. He want to community college for 2 years and then got in the door as a Coop. They then paid for his undergrad degree, and his MBA. He obviously worked very hard and had to go to school nights and weekends while working full time and starting a family, but now he has a great job and no student loan debt.

His story is very practical, and kind of the opposite of paying $50K per year to go to a Private School to pursue a degree in English Literature or Marketing or something.

We knew a very wealthy family whose son was accepted into Duke. Money was no object (the dad had sold a huge business and retired to start a foundation giving his money away to good causes), but the kid elected to spend the first couple years at community college rather than pay Duke for all 4 years. His rationale was he could still transfer in and have enough money left over to buy a house! Rich and smart!

A family friend was the dean of the business school for a major university after retiring as head of Ford Europe. Over dinner one night he talked about how broken college is. He compared it to an auto plant. Ford didn’t shut the plants down all summer and for weeks at a time over the rest of the year. It wouldn’t cost so much if you could finish in 2-3 years instead of letting that investment in infrastructure sit there empty so much. That’s not even considering virtual options. He hated how wasteful it was and wanted to get kids ready for the real world by making school more like a real job. That would have made the experience a LOT less enjoyable for me! LOL

[Masterofreality]

Still waiting for our resident Liberals to defend Joe Biden and Kamala Harris or point out something that they have done correctly, other than following a vaccine distribution plan that was already in place before inauguration.
Now going on 5 days when they couldn’t wait 5 minutes to attack a President of the other party. Meanwhile another Story that was foisted upon the public about Trumps supposed “photo op” in DC around Lafayette Park- that stated that protestors were cleared from the area to allow Trumps church photo op- is debunked by, of all places, a reporter for NBC!! And the Washington Post is now literally going back and changing headlines and stories that were anti-Trump when they were first published so unless you have a screenshot of the headline, you’ll never know their errors. “Clean up in Column 5!”

Crickets......

[Muskie in dayton]

This study by scientists at Ohio State University may explain a lot of what we run into here in our discussions:

Interestingly, it was done before the nonsense of January 6th, and the resulting drumbeat of the stolen election lie, and its consequences;

https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/7/23/eabf1234

This was also done before:
- The "Trump knew about Russian bounties on our troops" hoax,
- The "Trump threatened the GA Secretary of State to find votes for him" hoax,
- The cover-up of the content on Hunter Biden's laptop
- The "Officer Sidenick was killed by Capital rioters" hoax
- and fresh off the press, the "Trump had peaceful protesters tear-gassed so he could do his bible photo-op" hoax.
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/poli...ry?id=78171712

Yes that's right kids, another media fabrication exposed. Who believes fake news?

Makes you wonder what else they're lying to you about.

[bobbiemcgee]

So you believe the Big Lie, do ya. Think 1/6 were just innocent tourists? Covid was a hoax? I think everyone is glad to be rid of the scumbag.

[paulxu]

A Washington Post timeline on June 8,2020, (that's a year ago)reviewing the trouble on Lafayette Square, points out that the police were clearing the protestors so contractors could erect new barriers.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/inves...urch-photo-op/

[Masterofreality]

So you believe the Big Lie, do ya. Think 1/6 were just innocent tourists? Covid was a hoax? I think everyone is glad to be rid of the scumbag.

Still living in the past and ignoring the present. Still.
-Border crisis
-$3.25/Gal gas
-Inflation rising
-Supply chains disrupted
-VP embarrassing on a friendly NBC interview and embarrassed in Guatemala by its President
-Violence between Israel & Hamas
-Unemployment payments encouraging laziness & not enough workers.
-Riots still happening in Portland
-China and Putin toying with Biden
-Presidents crack addicted son is a racist bastard who just throws the N word around indiscriminately.

Hey!! It’s going great. How about moving attention into the current Administration period since that is what is affecting daily life now.

[JEHARDI]

No fan of Biden but you are ignoring the fact that a number of these issues were going to happen regardless who won.

Still living in the past and ignoring the present. Still.
-Border crisis - ongoing issue, the wall was a waste of $.
-$3.25/Gal gas - pipeline decision was a poor one but has not yet had an impact on gas prices. They would be where they are regardless.
-Inflation rising- Trump spent like a Democrat, we were going to be dealing with inflation regardless.
-Supply chains disrupted- supply chain issues were set in motion well before Biden.
-VP embarrassing on a friendly NBC interview and embarrassed in Guatemala by its President - agree
-Violence between Israel & Hamas- age old problem that has flared up for generations
-Unemployment payments encouraging laziness & not enough workers. - Trump spent like a Democrat and he killed the GA republican senators chances when he made them backtrack on their lack of support for the additional stimulus
-Riots still happening in Portland - agree
-China and Putin toying with Biden- they toyed with Trump too, nothing new.
-Presidents crack addicted son is a racist bastard who just throws the N word around indiscriminately. - agree, he is a jackass.

Hey!! It’s going great. How about moving attention into the current Administration period since that is what is affecting daily life now.

[bobbiemcgee]

Gas prices = Colonial pipeline fiasco, Texas refineries freeze (took weeks and months to get back online) due to inept Governor, demand up 60% over Memorial Day as people get the hell out of Dodge. Or your basic supply and demand.
trump Pandemic?= no demand. Cue Dr. Mastrianni.

[Strange Brew]

Gas prices = Colonial pipeline fiasco, Texas refineries freeze (took weeks and months to get back online) due to inept Governor, demand up 60% over Memorial Day as people get the hell out of Dodge. Or your basic supply and demand.
trump Pandemic?= no demand. Cue Dr. Mastrianni.

Gas prices were low by comparison before the pandemic. Energy independence/adundance = high supply = lower commodity prices.

[boozehound]

We knew a very wealthy family whose son was accepted into Duke. Money was no object (the dad had sold a huge business and retired to start a foundation giving his money away to good causes), but the kid elected to spend the first couple years at community college rather than pay Duke for all 4 years. His rationale was he could still transfer in and have enough money left over to buy a house! Rich and smart!

That's a great plan for a responsible kid. I'd be a little concerned about giving a less responsible young adult the option of taking cash instead of tuition, but it sounds like it worked in this case. You could always offer a deal along the lines of "If you graduate from X University (in this case, Duke), you can take the rest of your college fund in the form of a down payment on a house".

I'm planning to give each of my kids a set amount for college: somewhere between $100K and $200K, but probably closer to $100K. It's not going to cover 4 years tuition + Room and Board at an expensive school, but that's kind of the point. I'd like for them to have some 'skin in the game' so that they aren't just screwing around. That $100K is also subject to my approval of their course of study - I'm not paying for bullshit majors or bad grades.