Can you build a life from $25?
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Stan Shannon wrote:
Don't worry, I think this is one of the things Obama plans to change.
I don't normally do predictions but I would be willing to bet like a dinner that rich people will still be able to pretend to be poor after attending college and receiving a bachelors degree regardless of who is elected president.
led mike
No, I'm actually pretty sure that is what "change" means. Otherwise, why Obama?
Please excuse my refusal to participate in the suicide of western civilization
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Rob Graham wrote:
you're about to vote for Obama
Sure am!
Rob Graham wrote:
why should his background or education invalidate the experiment?
Didn't say that, did I?
oilFactotum wrote:
Sure am!
Me too!
Please excuse my refusal to participate in the suicide of western civilization
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oilFactotum wrote:
You see what you want to see.
Wait a damn minute. You started this by disputing the validity of the "experiment' in Al's link, and threw out Barbara Ehrenreich's experiment as counter example. When i challenge your counter-example you fall back on accusing me of "seeing what I want to see". Unable to counter the logic, you attack the person. What a poor loser you are.
Rob Graham wrote:
When i challenge your counter-example
No, what you did is cherry pick a few items from a wiki and drew some unsupported conclusions. That is "seeing what you want to see".
Rob Graham wrote:
Unable to counter the logic
Sorry, logic wasn't involved.
Rob Graham wrote:
What a poor loser you are.
Can't say that I've lost anything. A rich boy's lark doesn't prove a thing about the life of the homeless or the working poor.
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oilFactotum wrote:
That's what you think, but it is based on no information at all. You haven't read the book.
Enlighten me then. Why did she walk out on her work? Did she fail to plan? Did she even have a goal?
oilFactotum wrote:
Yes, that is your notion.
Certainly, one that I've seen proven time and time again.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
Enlighten me
Read the book, broaden your horizons.
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No, I'm actually pretty sure that is what "change" means. Otherwise, why Obama?
Please excuse my refusal to participate in the suicide of western civilization
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Chris Austin wrote:
Enlighten me
Read the book, broaden your horizons.
I see no value in the book. I find much more value in finding stories of success and trying to understand why and how people achieved their long term goals.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
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I see no value in the book. I find much more value in finding stories of success and trying to understand why and how people achieved their long term goals.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
I see no value in the book.
We wouldn't want anything to complicate your notions.
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Ok, I'll accept your point for the sake of the argument. :) But, this really makes me wonder about Ehrenreich and her failure.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
But, this really makes me wonder about Ehrenreich and her failure.
Good, they are both experiments and all they can do is approximate the scenario. From experiments like that you can compile information about the scenario. Those pieces of information can be helpful in trying to decide how to move forward in problem solving. However they are not a testament to anything. They don't provide any sort of holistic revelation of the scenario. Something that a person with a bachelors degree should be able to comprehend. I would say that if anything he has proven that his education was a waste. "The book, he says, is a testament to what ordinary Americans can achieve." My ass! Only for people that think a rich person with a bachelors degree qualifies as an "ordinary American". Rich people like that guy don't know the first thing about not being rich. Him and his book and his experiment and his point of view are all garbage, period.
led mike
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Rob Graham wrote:
When i challenge your counter-example
No, what you did is cherry pick a few items from a wiki and drew some unsupported conclusions. That is "seeing what you want to see".
Rob Graham wrote:
Unable to counter the logic
Sorry, logic wasn't involved.
Rob Graham wrote:
What a poor loser you are.
Can't say that I've lost anything. A rich boy's lark doesn't prove a thing about the life of the homeless or the working poor.
Thank you for proving my point by continuing the ad hominem attack.
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Chris Austin wrote:
But, this really makes me wonder about Ehrenreich and her failure.
Good, they are both experiments and all they can do is approximate the scenario. From experiments like that you can compile information about the scenario. Those pieces of information can be helpful in trying to decide how to move forward in problem solving. However they are not a testament to anything. They don't provide any sort of holistic revelation of the scenario. Something that a person with a bachelors degree should be able to comprehend. I would say that if anything he has proven that his education was a waste. "The book, he says, is a testament to what ordinary Americans can achieve." My ass! Only for people that think a rich person with a bachelors degree qualifies as an "ordinary American". Rich people like that guy don't know the first thing about not being rich. Him and his book and his experiment and his point of view are all garbage, period.
led mike
led mike wrote:
My ass! Only for people that think a rich person with a bachelors degree qualifies as an "ordinary American".
Nonsense. He is no less ordinary than you or I.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
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Chris Austin wrote:
I see no value in the book.
We wouldn't want anything to complicate your notions.
It's more of a case of polluting my mind with defeatist attitudes.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
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led mike wrote:
My ass! Only for people that think a rich person with a bachelors degree qualifies as an "ordinary American".
Nonsense. He is no less ordinary than you or I.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
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led mike wrote:
My ass! Only for people that think a rich person with a bachelors degree qualifies as an "ordinary American".
Nonsense. He is no less ordinary than you or I.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
Chris Austin wrote:
Nonsense. He is no less ordinary than you or I.
Relatively speaking, those who post on this board are unusually well-to-do by benefit of our profession. I'm sure there are exceptions, but I think that stands as a rule. We here have benefits we can't imagine others not having, so they are biases fundamental to our worldview.
It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity. - Albert Einstein
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"A former college athlete with a bachelor's degree," :laugh::laugh: I guess "starting from scratch" didn't mean what I thought it did! :laugh::laugh:
led mike
led mike wrote:
I guess "starting from scratch" didn't mean what I thought it did!
And he always knew he could end it any time he wanted to. A simple phone call to the family and they'd have sent him a ticket home. You hear the same thing about how Bill Gates was so successful and he's a college dropout. What they fail to tell you is that Bill Gates was a rich kid who dropped out of Harvard. He came with a safety net that meant he didn't have to worry about feeding himself in the event of failure or while he was playing budding entrepreneur. It's a lot easier to attempt success when failure has no consequences.
Doing my part to piss off the religious right.
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It's more of a case of polluting my mind with defeatist attitudes.
A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - -Lazarus Long
I see. Since you want to believe that "it's 100 percent attitude" you want to be sure not to learn anything that might suggest that attitude alone is not likely to be enough.
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led mike wrote:
I guess "starting from scratch" didn't mean what I thought it did!
And he always knew he could end it any time he wanted to. A simple phone call to the family and they'd have sent him a ticket home. You hear the same thing about how Bill Gates was so successful and he's a college dropout. What they fail to tell you is that Bill Gates was a rich kid who dropped out of Harvard. He came with a safety net that meant he didn't have to worry about feeding himself in the event of failure or while he was playing budding entrepreneur. It's a lot easier to attempt success when failure has no consequences.
Doing my part to piss off the religious right.
Tim Craig wrote:
It's a lot easier to attempt success when failure has no consequences.
e.g., that credit card he carried around in his back pocket for emergencies. I have friends who are stuck in go-nowhere jobs in the middle of hicksville because they don't have the money to move to places with better jobs. The cost of attempting to better their lot is prohibitive when it's a choice between their children eating and spending that same money to move. I won't say this makes such attempts impossible, it doesn't; only much harder than the well-off can ever comprehend.
It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity. - Albert Einstein
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Tim Craig wrote:
It's a lot easier to attempt success when failure has no consequences.
e.g., that credit card he carried around in his back pocket for emergencies. I have friends who are stuck in go-nowhere jobs in the middle of hicksville because they don't have the money to move to places with better jobs. The cost of attempting to better their lot is prohibitive when it's a choice between their children eating and spending that same money to move. I won't say this makes such attempts impossible, it doesn't; only much harder than the well-off can ever comprehend.
It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity. - Albert Einstein
Patrick S wrote:
I won't say this makes such attempts impossible, it doesn't; only much harder than the well-off can ever comprehend.
If you have responsibilities and are trying to meet them, then your options and ability to take risk are limited. On a somewhat related note, venture capitalists are looking for people still in college based on the success of the founders of the likes of Google and Yahoo. When you're young and have no responsibility, you can take all the risks you want. There's really no downside. You fall flat, you go out and get a job. Things have changed considerably in the last half century. Boomers at the same stage in life whose parents were children of the depression, were taught to be risk averse.
Doing my part to piss off the religious right.
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Stan Shannon wrote:
No, I'm actually pretty sure that is what "change" means. Otherwise, why Obama?
What's he, or anyone else, going to do? Create the Anti Acting Poor Act?
led mike
The change will be that there will be no need to act, but thats ok because actually being poor will be so comfortable that people will actually enjoy it (until they run out of rich people to bilk, of course)
Please excuse my refusal to participate in the suicide of western civilization
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The change will be that there will be no need to act, but thats ok because actually being poor will be so comfortable that people will actually enjoy it (until they run out of rich people to bilk, of course)
Please excuse my refusal to participate in the suicide of western civilization
These people seem to be constitutionally unable to think rationally about this and issues related to it. Just look at the "thinking" going on here: "He knew he had a life-line out (of his self-imposed poverty) if his experiment had failed, therefore the fact that he worked himself out of abject poverty is of no account." Yet at the same time: "Barbara Ehrenreich's experiment "proved" that the American Dream is an illusion. Or a nightmare."
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These people seem to be constitutionally unable to think rationally about this and issues related to it. Just look at the "thinking" going on here: "He knew he had a life-line out (of his self-imposed poverty) if his experiment had failed, therefore the fact that he worked himself out of abject poverty is of no account." Yet at the same time: "Barbara Ehrenreich's experiment "proved" that the American Dream is an illusion. Or a nightmare."
You do have to pity them. People such as led Mike, oilfactotum, etc, could no more think for themselves than they could rise and fly. Thinking, as a skill, has simply been educated out of them. Thinking is as dangerous to their intellectual masters as is the spectre of poor people working their way out of poverty depending upon nothing but free market capitalism itself. They have been so throughly indoctrinated into leftist idealogy that they define intelligence exclusively as the extent to which a person agrees with the tenents of Marxism. Of course, they don't recognize it as such. To them it simply represents an altogether democratic evolution in modern social thought, and the only reason someone might oppose it is out of some kind of negative anti-humanist sentiments such as 'hate' or 'intolerance' or 'bigotry' or any of the value laden words they have had drilled into them by the church of humanism. Growing up they were given a cookie, or a head pat,or an A, every single time they appropriately regurgitated some kind of leftist mantra. Their brainwashing has been complete, and they are utterly incapable of percieving the world in any way other than how they have been taught.
Please excuse my refusal to participate in the suicide of western civilization