TemplarKormac
Political Atheist
Legal reform. Specifically reform geared towards ending execution as a punishment. If everyone has the right to live their life from its natural beginning at conception to its natural end with death, and nobody has the right to deprive another of that right, then how is it consistent to deem capital punishment okay?
My approach is harsh, but one life can only equal another. A person may not use his or her life to rob another of theirs. Each life is sacred, we treat it as such or we die.
In complete honesty I'm on the fence about this one. My biggest problem comes from the fact that there's often still a chance for recovery.
Perhaps, or clinging onto that chance may cause you more pain when the reality suggesting otherwise sets in. There are times when letting go is the most merciful and less painful thing you can do for yourself.
Democratic peace theory - Wikipedia the free encyclopedia Diplomacy really does act to prevent war in many cases.
In reality, or in my opinion at least, violence has solved more issues that diplomacy alone. Diplomacy is nothing more than the proverbial can being kicked down the road... even if you kick it a hundred miles down the road when you're walking, you'll still have to kick it again when you get that far down the road, if that is what you're intent to do. That, or you can just pick it up and find the nearest recycling bin and do the environment a favor! I just don't place much value on talking. For example, the Iran nuclear deal is a prime example of what "talking" can do. Talking can lead to travesties like that, it can do more harm than good and endanger our key allies. Issues like that can be settled more easily by the end of a blade rather than the tip of a pen or a man's tongue.
My dad has a saying for people who are all talk who refuse to back it up with anything substantial:
"Battleship mouth, rowboat ass."
People shouldn't have to be, no, but that's what we have right now: a little over five out of every hundred people in this country relying on a government check just to help get them through the month. I'm not saying it should remain that way indefinitely, but I am saying that becoming independent takes time and people have to eat.
Let's put it this way. Government assistance shouldn't be temporary, right? So, then, it should be cut off after a certain period. Other people who, just like them, are struggling to get by simply by pouring what little they earn into the pockets of other poor individuals. I see that as counterproductive. Circular. I mean yes, there are people who will never be able to make it financially by themselves, and exceptions are a given. But for other people who are taking advantage of this system, continuously taking money off the backs other hard working people, and of the aforementioned poor person, there should be a definite, mandatory time limit on how long they can receive assistance. I have no mercy on people who steal...yes, steal from other taxpayers to fund their own laziness.
Even if we do manage to drop unemployment levels, we're still going to need a strong safety net for the inevitable falls and all the people who will never be able to support themselves, such as the elderly and severely disabled.
No arguing there.
Poverty, like inequality can never be truly eliminated. Fighting it can be costly, and in some cases damaging. Look at our debt. A great bit of it has been accrued by trying to bring people out of poverty. We have spent over 80 years fighting it, and we have just as many people (as far as I know) in poverty then than when the "War on Poverty" was enacted.Anti-poverty as in supportive of measures to reduce the breadth and severity of poverty in society.
But surely you understand why we can't just subsidize people out of poverty, right?
Raising taxes, especially corporate and on the highest earning brackets, to pay for all of this.
Question: If it isn't right to raise taxes on the poor, what makes it right to raise them on the rich? Why do they deserve to be penalized for being prosperous? Are we not forcing them to give? Forcing generosity by the iron hands of the government? Instead, let there be a flat tax that applies to all tax brackets except the absolute most poorest income earners.
Is the risk worth being branded a criminal? We have a process, and that process needs to be respected. I know full well that the United States can grant refugee status. Yet still they insist on violating our borders and adversely affecting our economy by taking advantages of loopholes sewn in what is supposed to be absolute immigration law.Because it's worth the risk considering the place they fled.
Living on the run here is better than living there and spending every day wondering when the cartels will force your children to smuggle drugs for them and every night wondering if a hit squad will target your house while you sleep.
Either way, aren't they still running? To me, as a figurative illegal immigrant, it wouldn't equate to noticeable change in lifestyle. Running is running, if not from drug gangs or government agents. It makes little difference.
Racism affects your quality of life if you're white. It's often a deciding factor in your personal safety if not. Think about how many deaths you wouldn't have heard about this year if non-white people could walk around in public without the risk of being murdered in cold blood by the exact same people they're paying to protect them?
No it doesn't. Cops are doing a service to this country. Another question: How many deaths this year could have been prevented, black or white, if cops were simply allowed to do their jobs without being painted this way? I'm pretty certain the murder rate in Baltimore and Chicago would testify as to what happens when cops are shamed into passivity for simply trying to effect the law. I can't abide by such a... inane argument, if you will.
These types of arguments only breed animus, they don't make the quality of life better for anyone. In fact, it worsens it, greatly. The people we pay to protect us aren't able to do the things we pay them to do... protect us. Somehow you are too busy berating them instead. What good are you to a cop when you don't appreciate the job he does to protect you and your fellow citizens? Why should he waste his time protecting someone who thinks poorly of what he does and what he is sworn to do? There are bad apples of course, but it is rather childish to brand him and everyone else who does the same duties diligently that way.
Another thing: It is quite ironic when a person hates on a cop for supposedly being racist, for targeting a black person arbitrarily, yet when they are wronged by the law by someone else, the first people they call for are those who enforce the law. Police. Those police, who are supposedly are launching some sort of racially motivated genocidal campaign against the African American race. The person forgets the statistics that say blacks kill more blacks than white cops do. It's only bad when cops do it. There's never a good reason for it, is there?
We are a more equal society than we were last century. The color of your skin matters somewhat less in general.
However, this flies in the face of the argument I just addressed, which was racism. How do you reconcile the contradictions made here? Either a black person can walk freely in public without being shot by a white cop, or they can't. Ether the cop is racist, or he's not. Either the black man is being treated poorly or shot to death on sight by police because of his skin color, or he's not. Or, he's being treated fairly, simply because shooting a black man on sight is murder and the black man is worth just as much equal protection under the law by law enforcement as a white man is.
A harmonious society doesn't have riots. It doesn't have as rife poverty, substance abuse, or domestic violence.
Unfortunately, this society is and never will be Utopian, or harmonious. Would it be idyllic? Yes. Is it possible? Not currently, and not for the foreseeable future. The one thing that gets in the way of all that is human nature.
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