March 31, 2017

Indict / impeach tRump & Pence on the same day: Force Ryan into Pres spot (stay with me here)

We don't want Ryan as President, but he doesn't want it now either because he wants to be 2024's Reagan to 2020's version of Carter.

If tRump & Pence go one by one, the one or the other will appoint VP successors and Ryan can politely decline if offered.

But if they both get incapacitated at the same time, per 25th Amendment, Ryan gets forced in automatically as President by the line of succession. Then he could resign but that would eliminate his chances of being Pres ever again. If he doesn't resign, then he becomes 2018's Ford and serves a two year term only.

March 26, 2017

It comes from a couple of ideological grounds and a mistaken self-view.

First there is the fiscal conservative idea that government should not forcibly take (taxes) and redistribute to the poor. That's "socialism" or "communism". That's what the Romans did through Herod. But paradoxically Republicons and christian RWAF adore Rome for its power and order and authoritarianism (lots of overlap between christians and RWAF).

Secondly, there is the idea that "god helps those who help themselves". It is the idea that hard work should be rewarded and needy people don't work hard. It is reinforced by the framing of language like "welfare queens". It shows itself in Republicon statements like Chaffetz saying that poor and people with pre-existing conditions need to choose between getting an Apple phone or health insurance / care.

The mistaken self-view is that they view themselves as "very charitable". They think that charities could and should do all the helping of the needy. They do not realize that the most charitable people, by percentage of disposable income, are the poor. The average RW christian is middle class and gives some money to churches and charities, many of which have high overhead, and some of which have CEOs and mega-pastors who live very high indeed.

So they overrate their charity and underrate the needs of people and ideologically endorse strict government fiscal conservatism.

March 10, 2017

ALL men were once pre-natal. ALL sons, grandson, nephews, etc. ALL male employees & underlings.

Ask RepubliCON lawmakers if they want their pre-natal grandsons to have the best chance of succeeding in life, whether rich or not.

Remind them that each dollar spent on pre-natal care saves thousands spent on post-natal and developmental and dependent adult care.

If we say that 1 in 10 people is disabled (an under-estimate) and that of those disabilities pre-natal care could be mitigated or reduced or eliminated them to the point of saving 20% in post-natal, childhood, and adult care, then it becomes very compelling. That would be 1 in 50, and let`s say that the savings are $100,000 over a lifetime (an underestimate).

1 in 50 times $100 K works out to a savings of $2K for every birth. If you spend even only $200 in pre-natal care, that is a very cost-effective savings, and that is an underestimate.

Unfortunately, Republicons are all about quarterly corporate profit reports and don't think much about the long term.

March 8, 2017

Boils down to convenience for ONE writer vs. convenience of 100s of readers. Assymetric

In the General Discussion forum, most threads have at least 300 views. Many have much more, but that would include multiple views as discussions progress. But let's assume 300 readers per Original Post and per most posts at the beginning of a thread as a lower bound on the number.

Dashing off quick OP with an opaque title and a sentence or two saves the writer time. Let's say it takes 30 seconds to do that. For comparison, let's say that a more informative title and several sentences summarizing key points and making a convincing case to view the video (live or YouTube) takes two minutes, 120 seconds for a little more typing and a little more thinking.

On the other side of the equation, a reader reading the better written OP can read it and decide whether to pursue it further within say 20 seconds. But dashed-off OP can easily take 60 seconds to puzzle out what it is referring to and then to glean from sparse clues enough information to decide to whether to pursue it.

However, to dramatize the case, let's suppose the difference in time is only 6 seconds instead of 40 seconds.

If there are 300 readers for every writer, dashing off an OP saves the writer 90 seconds and costs the readers 300 x 6 = 1800 seconds or half an hour.

On the other side of the ledger, if the writer spends an extra 90 seconds she/he saves readers half an hour of time.

Now, isn't it progressive and considerate to invest a mere 90 seconds to save the community a half hour?

Multiply that out by dozens of threads and it becomes easy to see that considerate writers make the community much more efficient.

[font size = "+1"]Who is the writer writing for anyway? Their own ego or the edification and enjoyment of 300 readers?[/font]