Unfortunately, due to the confluence of guaranteed student loans and the misleading statistics regarding lifetime earnings broken down by education level, everyone is led to believe that to become "successful" a college education is virtually mandatory. This, in turn, has led to many people attending college without the requisite intellectual, educational, or motivational foundation to get a degree in a rigorous, useful field. The university system in this country operates like any other business and wants as many paying customers as possible, therefore justifying hefty six figure salaries for professors and administrators. They have therefore created entire departments with heretofore unheard of degrees programs in fields previously unknown to be important to society and employers. Examples include Gender Studies, Feminist Theory, Queer Studies, fill in the blank ethnic studies, and all manner of grievance indoctrinating fields. This allows the academically challenged to get themselves into a potential lifetime of debt that cannot be discharged through bankruptcy but at least nominally allows them to claim to be educated. Then when they graduate and work as bartenders, waitresses, and Starbucks baristas, they can nourish their grievances because the system led them to believe that college equals financial success but they are broke and living with their parents. They then vote democrat because capitalism sucks and that valuable education along with their health care, cell service, and internet service should be free.

Countries like Germany, Austria, etc. that have "free" university education also have two tiered education systems that lead either to a useful trade or the government paying for a college education that will prove useful to the society footing the bill. Lefties agitating for "free" college don't understand that as our college attendance requirements and available degree fields exist now, such a system would be ruinous. The taxpayer cannot be expected to subsidize useless degrees in intellectually vacuous fields.

There is a tremendous need for skilled tradesman in our country and these occupations are necessary, honorable, and most importantly, lucrative. I know many a contractor, plumber, and electrician pulling down six figure incomes and working for themselves. All three of my biological children have high IQ's. My two daughters had straight A's in HS and went on to get degrees in chemical engineering and law. My son is a Caterpillar diesel mechanic and I am just as proud of him as my daughters. He, like many males, simply did not enjoy sitting in a classroom all day and spending the rest with his nose in a book studying.

 

Actually I think it has remained quite civil. As long as we all contribute like mature adults, it will stay that way. I participate in many online forums related to various interests, and frankly, this thread, interestingly enough, certainly helps to disprove the stereotype of pickup drivers (think rude, angry Prius driver).

 

I always do. It helps me weed out who I can and can't count on. Sometimes who the moral people are, and the immoral.

Real friends and family members help each other, and can be counted on in times of hardship. I witnessed my aunts and uncles fighting over who got stuck taking care of grandpa. None of them are family to me anymore. If they can't handle the burden of family, then don't burden me with wasted time pretending that you're family on the holidays. I'm down to 5 family members and maybe 5 real friends.

Ever call a friend because you're stuck, and they act like it's the biggest inconvenience in the world, even though they had nothing important going on?

Gone. I don't need friends like that.

 

 

X2 again..

 

Very, very true comments. I call them "empty degrees." Any job possibilities in these fields are very few and far between.

Meanwhile, I know a couple of people who actually decided college wouldn't help them financially, and went on to form successful landscape and construction companies. They are making six figures and employing quite a few at this point. Their high school guidance counselors strongly advised them to go to college or they would never make it.


Just when you think there isn't a job available for some of these ridiculous degrees, you haven't fully grasped the ignorance of our government. Take this $1M payout for a study on the drinking habits of lesbians, for example:
Feds spend $911,056 studying the drinking habits of lesbian couples | Fox News

 

Well said! Most, but not all, of my close friends are of a like mind politically. However, we are able to disagree amicably on certain subjects and yet the friendships are rock solid just like the individuals with whom they are formed. If the SHTF, each of us could count on the other without question. I cannot say the same about certain "family" members. My wife's father and stepmother have hardly spoken to her after learning she voted for Trump. They have become downright hostile towards me due to my political views despite the fact that I never discuss politics with them. He was an absentee father who never paid a dime of court ordered child support when my wife was growing up. The next time they need help, and they will, the imbecilic deplorable who worked sixty hours a week with the big bank account will be telling them to call one of their broke socialist friends or the nearest DNC office.

 

But Israel has been doing that since 1948. And it’s ok for them kill civilians, steal land, perpetrate apartheid, and take $17 billion plus of your and my tax money annually to fund it? Why? And why doesn’t that anger so many more Americans?Because they praise God and not Allah? Didn’t you ever wonder why so much of Palestine is now called the Occupied Territorries? Don’t you wonder why three Israeli Prime Ministers in the last 40years have been charged with war crimes and, in the case of Ariel Sharon, genocide? These are facts, and history. This isn’t made up BS or propaganda. And no, Palestinians do not want to wipe Israel off the map. They want to live in peace with Christians, Jews, and Muslims as they once did for centuries. When Palestine was open to all. This is the Holy Land. It is the most sacred region in the world for Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike. That is a fact going back over 2000 years. It can not simply be appropriated to any single group and the other occupants, residing on the same soil for a thousand years, be killed, their land stolen, and their way of life destroyed. This is the very unfortunate history of Palestine. This is reality. Do I support backpack suicide bombers targeting innocent civilians? Of course not. Do I support a peaceful resolution and a 2-state solution? Absolutely.
Please. Try to objectively review the history of this region since 1948, or at least since 1967, and not rely on the propaganda spoon fed to the American people for so many decades. The more accurately you come to understand the real history of the region, the more incensed you will become. And the more angry you will get that such a large amount of your hard earned money is taken from your paycheck each week to fund Israeli atrocities. There must be a just and peaceful resolution. And despite what the U.S. press maintains, nobody wants that more than the Palestinians. In fact, Hamas is a huge embarrassment to most Palestinians, and they do not support the terror tactics they employ.
Again, please: judge me as you will for my understanding, but do yourself a favor and get some accurate, historical facts that aren’t painted with partisan and religious spin.
These are some very uncomfortable truths for many Americans, but we can be strong enough and smart enough to move forward to peace and not simply bully an entire race into oblivion. What part of that is an American or a Christian sensibility? Let’s not let fear and a lack of understanding guide our path forward.

 

Your opinion is duly noted.

The way I see it, it's not much different than any other religion.

Science Thinks Humans are Special
Science Casts Out Heretics and Persecutes all Other Religions
Science Reveres Its Own Saints
Science Makes up Stories to Explain Our Origins
Science Has Its Own Code of Ethics
Science Has Its Own Priesthood
Science is Based on Established Dogmas
Science Will Bend to Accommodate Modern Trends
Most of Science is Unfounded
Science Requires Faith

 

This post doesn’t sound like it was written by somebody who is a member of the Democratic Party as it exists today. If you went to any democratic gathering and talked like that they would probably key your truck.

 

Those who support the premise that global warming, global climate change and global climate disruption (those are the three I'm aware of) are man-caused are forced to change the name of it whenever the name gets TOO associated with negativity. That way, they can "start fresh" with their lies and nonsense.

Man caused global climate change, et al., is 100% based on nothing more than computer models. Computer models that attempt to predict the future. Here is my problem with them: They can NOT take KNOWN data from yesterday and predict KNOWN results (what is happening today), yet they want us to believe them when they say they can take KNOWN data from today and predict UNKNOWN activities in the future. In short, plug KNOWN data into the models and they do NOT predict KNOWN results. The models are crap, as are those who claim it's legitimate. GCC is cyclical and has been happening for billions of years. Man has about as much ability to change the GLOBAL climate as a cup of red dye has the chance to change the color of the Atlantic Ocean.

 

Folks are respecting others' opinions. No reason for it to end poorly.

 

I respectfully disagree with much of what you posted.

And I certainly don't believe that being against those who gleefully and purposely target civilians (according to various human rights organizations) is either partisan or religious. It's about respecting other people.

 

I hope there is also the realization there that just because I vote Democratic that I shouldnt easily be lumped in with a whole raft of “Prius driving lesbians dry humping each other” as another person so eloquently put it in a prior post. I respect some of the tenants and guiding philosophies of the Republican Party, and I disagree with a LOT of the recent direction in my own party. It’s too bad I’m just simply labeled as one of those “effing libs.” That would be like me judging Christian Conservatives as ignorant racists in white sheets with pointy hats. It wouldn’t be fair, or accurate.
And if anyone keyed my truck, I’d punch them in the head. Whether they drove a Prius or not.

 

That’s my point exactly, and why I don’t stand with Israel. Because I’m not comfortable paying for this nonsense.