What Vidal said about Buckley was not just malicious but false. Buckley was a reactionary, arguably a racist, and inarguably a homophobe. His magazine, National Review , was a passionate admirer of Francisco Franco, the Spanish dictator, and has always had a habit of likening liberals to fascists and Nazis. But William F. Buckley, Jr., was not an adherent of genocidal anti-Semitism. He was not a Nazi, crypto or otherwise.
lol fuck off, Nazi apologist
The left’s version of the ever pending reinstatement
You guys said we’d never get the Repub senators on board for the 25th amendment!
Somebody needs a guillotining.
That guy stole hundreds of millions of dollars from Medicare and nothing happened to him except he got to keep all the money
But he also has to live with the shame of knowing that he violated norms. WOW! BOOM!
Some people agree with this.
Oh great we’re digging up very old posts to fuck with me again, and as usual refusing to understand my point.
I don’t believe UBI is the best solution - not because of what it will do to the job market, as you’re implying - but because I think people get sucked into situations that aren’t best for them.
I think people need to feel useful to their tribe, and not everyone is going to be a self-motivated artist. But at the same time it’s easy to get sucked into doing nothing, and spiral downward. I’ve seen it happen to multiple friends on long-term govt assistance. They’re miserable. I’ve had the same thing happen to me when I work from home and have nothing to do.
This is just a theory that I can’t put my finger on, but I think there’s some corrosive psychological thing with being dependent on another person or entity for what seems like a free handout. Humans need at least the illusion that we earned that money. Otherwise our self-esteem goes into a spiral. Or something like that that I’m not stating very well.
I’d just like to see any other solution - free healthcare, negative income taxes, food stamps, child care credits, higher minimum wage, 20-hour workweek, free college, etc. etc. etc. exhausted first before we start giving people free money. Again - not because I give as shit about the job market, but because I think it turns into a venus flytrap for a lot of people, myself included.
I understand your point. Its the same point they were making. That is what made me think about this.
Humans absolutely need something to feel proud of. People spiral just as quickly with millions of dollars and nothing to do as they do with zero dollars and nothing to do. Sometimes the rich people can feel proud of all the shit they own or whatever, and it works for them. Sometimes actual lazy poors can feel proud of being good at Fortnite and that works for them. But a really lotta people get in big trouble with no purpose.
No it’s not the same point. They’re saying we need to take away unemployment to boost the job market. Fuck the job market - those assholes can just pay better.
I’m saying I’m leery of UBI because I think a good chunk of people will ultimately be miserable on it.
FWIW I could be wrong on this. Maybe everyone pushes through that phase and ultimately finds something to engage them and make them happy. But my sense is I’d still rather try all the other stuff first.
I think the vast majority of them instead try to convince themselves that they have made some big and important special contribution to society, and surround themselves with people that reinforce that attitude. The pre-20th century monarchs for example certainly enjoyed their material wealth, but I think they also were absolutely delusional about their role in the world and derived vast personal satisfaction from their totally made up narratives about God putting them in power to be shining examples to the peasants. It is absolutely striking how much this overlaps with the rich in America today.
I’m legitimately glad I wasn’t born rich and will never have to worry about being rich or trying to raise rich kids to be decent humans.
I’m glad I had to work for a living. But also I realize that’s easy for me to say given I like what I do. But I did also work a million shit jobs in my youth to make me appreciate the job I have now.
I agree with this. I just don’t think working at a fast food place fills the majority of people with purpose.
Yeah it’s 100% pathological. Just like royalty, a lot of the rich tell themselves that none of this is possible w/o them, and their life is simply worth some huge multiple of a normal person’s.
I can’t imagine how boring it would be to be ensconced in that world where the only people you ever interact with are other rich people or servants.
But the underlying argument is the same. If people are not hungry enough to work they won’t.
It interesting because your solutions are more pro job market.
As a society we have blurred the lines of purpose and what you do to add value to GDP. I would suggest they are not the same and to the extent they are is the result of really good propaganda.
I waited tables and got purpose out of it. It felt good on a primal level to feed people and watch them go away happy.
I never did fast food but I did plenty of other shit jobs that I always found some way to take pride in. Although I’m sure that would have worn off eventually.
Yeah - I think a lot of people, myself especially, need a kick in the pants to get moving sometimes. But ultimately we’re better off for it.
I know I wasn’t self-actualized enough in my 20s to go out and find a job if I didn’t have to. And I would have just gotten fat(ter) and miserable.
I can handle it now in my 50s, but still just barely.
The purpose part to me is about working to feed yourself, or support your family. It’s a primal thing that most people need to feel imo. To me the alternative is Wall-E where you never have to lift a finger for anything.
Then again, first-world people do engage lots of unnecessary exercise to make up for what we’re missing in our jobs. So maybe we would fill in all those blanks.
But seriously - why not just take all those productivity gains and start shortening the work week? Why have a world where some people work zero hours (and don’t have much spending money) while others work 40 or more and have all the spending money but no time? How about a world, at least at first, where everyone gets a 3-day weekend all the time?
It seems like the Democrat corporate donor class/MSM hegemony is fine with talk about UBI because they’re pretty sure it’s just a pipe dream. But talk about shortening the work-week is dangerous and must be squashed.
I feel like that’s a better start than just jumping straight to UBI - which would be like putting everyone on the equivalent of current unemployment or disability - where they can get by w/o a job but they probably have to move back with their parents or something.
I realize we’re well off topic but I think these are good points and would support both a shortened work week and some sort of UBI program, but I disagree that “losing purpose” needs to be a primary concern when considering these programs. To be clear, I 100% agree that some people would lose their purpose without some sort of “project” to work on, and many people find that outlet in their employment. I think the net result of a policy like that, though, would be that more people eliminate stress or find a “better” purpose than those who lose their purpose entirely and fall apart, so it’s still a net positive. I think I’m one of the people like you who needs something engaging to remain relatively sane, and I think it might take some work to find that thing if I won the lottery tomorrow, but I still think it’s doable. It’s just a different kind of stress.
Yeah, I think this is correct. A UBI gives someone the freedom to leave some bullshit job they need to make rent and actually find something they like doing.
Also taking away that leverage would certainly have bosses treat people decently. You really only get away with treating people like shit if they need that job to survive
I definitely don’t think everyone would stop working if they got ubi. They would want extra money still for nicer car/clothes/housing.