Laugh at Trump all you want

[spookini]

Hmm, the minimum wage / education thread? -- not completely unrelated to Trump..
(wants to abolish Dept of Education; failed to pay minimum wage to his construction workers). 
So, at least Stoneaxe will be happy. 

Magenta, here's a challenge to your "education is worthless" argument...We have an employee who belongs to a non-mainstream religion. 
Curious, I googled to learn a bit more.  Among other things, these folks believe the end is near..
Time remaining should be spent 'getting ready' -- not on trivial things, like education.
They liken higher education to vices such as smoking, alcohol, or drugs..

Interesting to see of ALL the religions in the US, these folks have the lowest per capita income.  BY FAR.  Way down there..
So don't write off Ichabod and education just yet -- or your could end up more familiar with min. wage than you'd like.

[stoneaxe]

I love how you throw the underhand jabs spook. I want a higher minimum wage and I've said so here before...but you know that.

Progressive PC policies have caused  more damage to schools than anything, generational welfare, single moms by the 1,000's...shit millions, inner city public housing ghettoes. Millions of ESL kids with little to no resources. Inner city schools aren't doing poorly because of lack of funding....it's lack of family and parenting. Finland gets held up as an example and it should but they aren't dealing with the same problems.

[surf4food]

Finland gets held up as an example and it should but they aren't dealing with the same problems.

As a liberal (but not really a "progressive"), that's one thing I can't disagree with.  People who use Finland or any other European country as a talking point for their argument overlook the fact that circumstances very and what works over there doesn't mean it will work hear, at least not to the same degree.  Not just because of what problems we or they deal with or don't deal with, there are so many factors also.

[robon]

Different countries, but funding cuts to schools is a huge problem in Canada. Absolutely massive fucking problem. Entire positions are being axed whole scale and I have witnessed first hand what this does to the morale in schools and how the kids suffer. Positions that help teachers accommodate diversity in the classrooms are being cut back dramatically and eliminated outright. Child and youth care workers, Special needs workers, etc, etc, Class sizes have gotten much larger over time, and teachers have less resources to cope. Sure, funding needs to be managed, but anyone who says funding isn't an issue obviously isn't working in a school these days.

I also draw a parallel with single moms at the poverty level trying to cope and put their kids through school, and there is a lot of them. A lot more Dads struggling than many people realize as well. A lot of people are born into poverty and it's not easy to break out of when there is a family involved, and there is also a new working poor, dual income family in the mix now, which wasn't nearly as prevalent even just 20 years ago. The system is completely fucked. Inflation has far outpaced the means for many people to cope financially now. Even middle class families with dual incomes struggle much more now than they once did. Much more. When house prices triple or even quadruple in many areas in less than 30 years, and everything else rises in price, something is going to give. Student loan debt has gone up close to 300% in many places in Canada since the 90s early 2000s. People are being set up to struggle and fail big time these days.

[magentawave]

I love to learn new stuff which is why I've always been a voracious reader so I'd be the last one to say "education is worthless." What I meant is that it takes a lot of balls to call what goes on in government schools "education" and statistics prove that. Being that you are a teacher I'm sure you already know this, but the system of "education" adopted by most schools in the world was developed in Prussia for the purposes of creating conformist tax cattle and obedient soldiers. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prussian_education_system

Trump says some horrific shit, but that's because he has no filter like all the other psychopathic pussy's that are running who's every word is a memorized and rehearsed series of talking points run through focus groups. If you listen closely between the bluster and horrific bullshit, he says a few good things, like, abolish the Department of Education, dump NATO, stop being world cop and have a less interventionist foreign policy.

Hmm, the minimum wage / education thread? -- not completely unrelated to Trump..
(wants to abolish Dept of Education; failed to pay minimum wage to his construction workers). 
So, at least Stoneaxe will be happy. 

Magenta, here's a challenge to your "education is worthless" argument...We have an employee who belongs to a non-mainstream religion. 
Curious, I googled to learn a bit more.  Among other things, these folks believe the end is near..
Time remaining should be spent 'getting ready' -- not on trivial things, like education.
They liken higher education to vices such as smoking, alcohol, or drugs..

Interesting to see of ALL the religions in the US, these folks have the lowest per capita income.  BY FAR.  Way down there..
So don't write off Ichabod and education just yet -- or your could end up more familiar with min. wage than you'd like.

[spookini]

Stoney, I wasn't being underhanded... just trying to say maybe somehow this is still a Trump thread, even though we're drifting pretty far from the reservation.
I'm not saying I support $15/hr anyhoo.  Seems excessive for lo-skill underage, temporary labor, IMO.

BTW, the kiwi-banana bread loaf I just baked is delicious! 
Hilarious video 

[pdxmike]

It seems Finland gets mentioned every once in a while--why we should do what they do, why it won't work, etc.  It's also interesting to see what Finns think about U.S. politics:

[eastbound]

spook thanks for the attribution, but no idea wtf youre talking about, and certainly nothing ive ever said.

that said subber--i do in fact think the government should administer our student loan program. and no subsidy necessary.

our treasury borrows money today at %1.23

our banks lend money to students at 8%, and the loans are guaranteed by our gov't, and students cant declare bankruptcy--seems the banks are being subsidized and handed a license to steal from our young people--a fucking disgrace

our government could easily borrow at 1.25 and lend at 2 to our young people who have no money for college, and cover admin costs, and defaults.

but that would be socialism, god forbid!

[eastbound]

what does progressive have to do with PC?

"progressive" as applies to politics predates PC by decades, and has little to do with PC.

[surf4food]

what does progressive have to do with PC?

"progressive" as applies to politics predates PC by decades, and has little to do with PC.

People overuse the term PC/political correctness and often use it just to trumpet how un PC they fancy themselves. 

[stoneaxe]

You seriously believe there's no connection between progressives and PC in the common use of the term today?

[PonoBill]

Actually the progressive movement culminated around 1920, people calling themselves progressive today just simply mean liberal. If you quiz them about what they mean it's just a kind of ephemeral notion meaning something like "gooder" or maybe "goodest" that has nothing to do with the historical meaning of the word, so yeah, progressive and PC are identical.

[Ichabod Spoonbill]

Speaking as a progressive, I think the term became a popular descriptor in the early 2000s because the word "liberal" had been turned into a pejorative during the 1980s. It became a smear term, "That person is a liberal!" so the term progressive was adopted by liberals. The term PC "politically correct" refers to a kind of mish-mash of ways people alter their speech and behavior according to liberal ideas.

The objection to political correctness, which I share somewhat, is that it becomes a form of progressive censorship. There are two sides to this. One is the idea that you don't want people spewing hate speech or speech that hurts others. On the other hand, the level of sensitivity on this issue can get pretty out of hand. I remember laughing until I ached at Richard Pryor's racial humor. Dear God, that man was funny! But that kind of humor usually doesn't fit political correct thinking anymore, or any racial humor.

Racial/ethnic humor can be bad when it's underlying message is "Hey, look at all those stupid black/white/gay/Jewish/women/men. Aren't we better than them." But when that humor points out what's ridiculous about people in general — and every group has its share — then it's awesome.

Bill, which movement are you referring to in the 1920s? Is it the US suffrage movement or the socialist parties or something else? (Or all these together?)

[lucabrasi]

Dyslexia? Aren't the ones you run across generally bright? Not a  bump on a log? Wouldn't "special "  considerations be better served in the classroom rather than down the road in 20 years on the job site?
Visited my daughter yesterday. Kindergarten classroom. I asked to see a stack of papers. A picture they drew at the top of them and their pet. Typical 5 year old art. Underneath a couple sentences. My name, pet name, kind of pet and one other. Sentences. Yes. Kindergarten. Ran together words, misspelled, all sorts but damn if they weren't writing. Grade 1-3 with 3 being top/proficient. All 2s and 3s. 2.5 many. Who else here could do that in kindergarten? Who remembers learning anything in kindergarten? I don't. Where the hell we losing our kids?
PC? Can start another thread and go for ages and all sorts of examples or definitions so to say but one may be....Isn't there a difference between mean spirited or hate and funny? There something out there for all of us that somehow may offend me but maybe not you. Oh well.
Liberal vs conservative? Would that be one that thinks more governing can solve things (sprinkle liberally) vs. one that thinks less intrusion from governing is better? Would progressive be a term made so as  to make liberal seem more modern? (see ichabod above) 
Laugh at Trump? How can you not but you really gots to look at the context of what is put out there, just like anyone else.

[spookini]

Ditto what Ich' said.   "Liberal": a schmear used to end conversation.  A favorite term of folks like A.Coulter, et al.  Cue the mental images of tree-huggers and welfare queens driving BMWs.

'Progressive'?  Being open to new ideas to fix problems.  I could be wrong, but I think the majority of Dem voters would identify as progressive, not liberal.  Maybe most Republican voters, too?.

What drives me nuts is when conservative leaders deny there's any problems needing solutions.
Remember when gas spiked to $5/gal?  The GOP leadership's solution to that one was to give everyone $100.. 

http://www.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/04/27/gas.rebate/index.html?PHPSESSID=83492f5ad25fcfef4746cf4d985ce6ad