Lines Blur as Texas Gives Industries a Bonanza

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

Well, I want the intellectually elite in charge of things. I want the smart people running the show.

1st person that steps up to me and uses the line that they are the "intellectually elite"?
Gets a bullet in the head!


That's the group running crap into the ground right now incase you missed things.

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by privateer

1st person that steps up to me and uses the line that they are the "intellectually elite"?
Gets a bullet in the head!


That's the group running crap into the ground right now incase you missed things.

George Bush and intellectually elite never go in the same sentence. We had 8 years of this whiz kid running the show. So, no, I did not miss much.

Do you have a better alternative? Snooki? The financially elite have been running the show.

Originally Posted by AVGWarhawk

Do you have a better alternative?

Nope. I'm a very pessimistic type person now a days.
I expect things to get much worse and billions to pay the price before things get better.
I'm thinking that may be the "better alternative".
A massive 'wipeing of the slate'.

[AVGWarhawk]

Originally Posted by privateer

Nope. I'm a very pessimistic type person now a days.
I expect things to get much worse and billions to pay the price before things get better.
I'm thinking that may be the "better alternative".
A massive 'wipeing of the slate'.

I'm pessimistic as well. Have been for quite sometime. I do not see things getting much worse. I see slow recovery, but a recovery non-the-less. BO and co will come out smelling like roses.

[GoldenRivet]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

If you can't see how giveaways to corporate special interests and the state of the education system are connected, do a little research to connect those dots.

Ok, I'll do it for you then: If you give money to one thing, it necessarily is not available to be spent on another thing.

mookie i understand this... all i'm saying is the business are not here paying zero state taxes, think of all the other revenues having business here generates. I dont see the problem in providing them incentives to come to Texas. Because let me tell you whats going to happen... you dont provide those incentives or enough of them those big companies that give the rest of us jobs are going to go employ the people in some other state while we sit with our thumbs in our butts.

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Bad education systems turn out teen mothers and dropouts. Look at the statistics for a given country's education level and compare that to its teen birth rate. I'll save you the trouble - they're negatively correlated.

bad education systems turn out teen mothers and drop outs? wrong... bad education systems turn out poorly educated people. I had a number of great teachers in my life just as i had a number of horrible ones. i never dropped out or got pregnant.

it falls squarely on the shoulders of mommy and daddy to tell the kids the dangers of screwing one another and having little redneck children. My mom and dad made me aware of those dangers, they gave me the talk and it wasnt up to any of my teachers to raise me so my parents wouldnt have to. I'd say look into the socioeconomic situation of the families with teen pregnancies. again i say - its not the fault of the corporations and the local governments that these kids hit 15 and strap a mattress to their backs.

I confess... at 16 i was screwing as if it were an effort to save all mankind. (a habit i really havnt broken yet) but for the love of God i knew the dangers, and i did so responsibly with often more than one sort of birth control involved. Condoms are dirt cheap... some places give them away. people make their own self destructive choices in life.

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

Look at this list of most admired people in 2011. Tell me how many are millionaires. Then try and say what you just said with a straight face.

I dont follow your logic here: USA today went to apparently Pennsylvania and polled 0.0005% of the US population and came up with that end all be all list of admired people?

I dont recall ever being asked who i admire, did they ask you?

what does that have to do with the price of rice in China?

yes i can say to you with a straight face - being "well of" or being "wealthy" or being "successful" etc doesnt make you a villain.

unfortunately doing anything but sitting on your ass on welfare is vilified these days.

Millionaires are automatically bad people by default in the eyes of a lot of folks out there

mookie i understand this... all i'm saying is the business are not here paying zero state taxes, think of all the other revenues having business here generates. I dont see the problem in providing them incentives to come to Texas. Because let me tell you whats going to happen... you dont provide those incentives or enough of them those big companies that give the rest of us jobs are going to go employ the people in some other state while we sit with our thumbs in our butts.

The problem with the incentives is the spiral they produce which makes it unaffordable within a very short time which leads to those companies relocating again.
Its a well worn pattern.

[GoldenRivet]

Originally Posted by Tribesman

The problem with the incentives is the spiral they produce which makes it unaffordable within a very short time which leads to those companies relocating again.
Its a well worn pattern.

what is the solution you have in mind?

charge them higher taxes, let them move to another state?

let that state get wise in another 10-20 years and repeat the pricess?

then what? all the jobs are in China?

Immigrate to China?

what is the solution you have in mind?

Solution????? If any of the countries which have already tried it had the solution it wouldn't be a dodgy prospect would it.
If you can think of a way to give companies big tax breaks by loading the tax onto the workers and not creating huge wage inflation, a property bubble together with the needed massive influx of low spending high maintainance very low paid workers to do the jobs other people cannot afford to do then I am sure there are dozens of countries that will beat a path to your door to have you run their exchequer

[Onkel Neal]

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

I was going off of this article, which I will grant you was from 2010, so things may have changed. http://www.texastribune.org/texas-ed...hool-diplomas/

Yes, and I am not disputing your article. "Adults without a HS diploma" could certainly be valid, we may have a lot more 30-60 year old dropouts that other states, wouldn't totally shock me. And as the article says, the huge influx of illegal aliens has a lot to do with it.

Originally Posted by mookiemookie

And it also mentions that a lot of people without those degrees are immigrants to the state (from other U.S. states and Mexico) so it may not be as much of an indicator of the quality of the Texas education system. But I was just reading an article the other day that says the OECD just completed a study that found that American children are now more likely to achieve the same or a lower level of schooling than their parents. Only one in five will achieve a higher educational level than their parents. The U.S. is the only major developed economy in the world where this is the case. So when you take those two facts together, it's a worrying trend for Texas.

A worrying trend for the whole country.

Originally Posted by Takeda Shingen

It is because we, as a nation, do not value education as they do in Europe (particularly Scandinavia) and the Asian nations of Pacific Rim. Our politicians and community 'interest groups' have politicized schools, labeling them as indocrtrination centers and creating enough distrust that problems are bound to occur. And when they do, they sit back and tell you "see, I told you so!". Parents further encourage their children in the belief that they are not answerable for their effort and behavior, and when the children are problematic in the classroom, the teacher is blamed for not being an effective educator and classroom manager. All of this is reinforced by the media which works very hard to promote the idea of the shiftless, lazy teacher sitting back making $80,000 per year and being answerable to no one. And when the result of all this subterfuge and meddling is a system that fails the student, they take it as evidence that they were right after all, despite the fact that the failure was the deliberate product of their own engineering.

QFT!

[Penguin]

Originally Posted by Hottentot

The more I read your posts, Mookie, the more I'm thinking you should move to Finland. You'd feel right at home. Well, except for the weather, but that's an acquired taste. And the language that you won't learn in your lifetime, but after a few rounds that's no obstacle for communication.

let's see what Finland and Texas have in common:

- both fought for independence against their neighbor country

- high rate of gun ownership

- incomprehensable language

- their inhabitants are considered as weird by their neighbors

- an unexplainable love for polka music




well, I'd say Mookie would feel at home indeed...

[mookiemookie]

From what I gather, Finns love to drink and curse, and there's Scandinavian women there. I think I'd fit right in as well.