who do you believe ?

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We certainly saw fake news when they blew up the GMC pickup claiming it's gas tank location was a problem for certain types of collisions, even though there hadn't been any real life explosions of a GMC pickup resulting from any collisions.

We certainly saw fake news when NBC showed Federal agents shooting basement cinder blocks with full auto M-16's while we were immersed in the debate about whether semiautomatic "assault weapons" such as the AR-15 should be banned. That one caught my father-in-law, who was a retired police officer. He said, "I don't have a problem with semi automatics, but no one needs a machine gun". I asked him why he thought the proposed "assault weapons" ban was regarding machine guns. He said he saw a news report where they were shooting basement cinder blocks. Aha! Fake news had done its job until I informed him otherwise.
 
"I don't have a problem with semi automatics, but no one needs a machine gun"
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I've known a lot of people with that point of view.

I try to point out to them that someone else deciding what people "need" is not, and never was a valid reason to ban anything.

One of my examples (which doesn't always work, but does get them thinking) is the minimum wage.

The govt sets a minimum wage. What employers must pay you, because that is the amount of money the govt says you need, to live on.

Therefore, every penny you make, over and above minimum wage should be taken by the govt (banned) since you don't NEED IT!!

Somehow, no one ever seems to agree with that....:rolleyes:
 
I try to point out to them that someone else deciding what people "need" is not, and never was a valid reason to ban anything.
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That is a good point. It's also not the Bill of Needs, it's the Bill of Rights. Rights are not dependent upon what the government or any other group thinks that we "need", as you pointed out in your minimum wage example.

Does anyone really "need" to read books now-a-days, since we have computers and the internet? Should the government be able to ban books because we don't "need" to have books?
 
Minimum wage is not and has never been about a living wage , looks like even you have drank the Dems koolaid 44 haha .

It was to protect the employee from slave wages . In times of great dispare and unemployment people will work for anything to get food on the table and there are plenty of people/companies willing to pay as little as possible if you let them . Minimum wage was designed to prevent that . It’s another reason why undocumented aliens do all the grunt work . You can pay them under the table below minimum wage and they have no recourse but to except whatever you’re willing to pay . Yes they can turn you in but you can turn them in as well .

I worked on landscaping 30 years ago and the company paid the illegal immigrants $20 a day plus lunch and they worked their butts off for that . I think minimum wage back then was somewhere close to $4 and I was making bank @ $6.50hr lol And like now you couldn’t get Americans to dig trenches or holes for 36 inch box trees for four bucks an hour just like you can’t get them to do it for 15 bucks an hour now . As much as things change they stay the same .

Somewhere in the last 10 years or so the minimum wage argument has been redefined as a living wage which it was never intended to do or promote. It another definition change we see oh so often in politics.

I don’t have a problem having a living wage argument just don’t hide it behind the the minimum wage regulations.
 
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I don’t have a problem having a living wage argument just don’t hide it behind the the minimum wage regulations.
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No, I haven't drunk their Kool-Aid, and I do understand the reality of a "living wage". I am, in fact living on a pension that actually pays me a few dollars a month less than my state's current minimum wage. I manage, barely, but I manage and not having to work 40hrs a week 4 weeks a month to get it, helps.

I deliberately chose the "minimum wage" as an EXAMPLE that most people, well beyond min wage law level, would recognize, and as something they would not like to have to go back to.

I never said it was a "living wage" I used it because it is a set Govt standard one that people would recognize and understand the logic of the argument.

I said that since the govt sets a standard, then that is what they think you "need". The whole point is about having someone, other than you, making binding legal decisions about what you or I "need", and how that is NOT a good thing. Having the Govt take away (ban) you from owning anything (including money) that they feel you or I do not "need" is bad.

Demanding the Govt DO just that, is worse. So when someone says "nobody needs a "xxx" and they should be banned, remember, you don't NEED all the money you make, so lets take that away, too!

After all, you could use that "unneeded" money for criminal acts, or to fund a political party, or ...or...or...anything else not "needed". :rolleyes:

Using money and the minimum wage as an example (and yes, realizing reality is different) is something everyone can relate to, even non-gun owners, who have a hard time connecting gun rights with their personal lives.
 
I understand your point , I just think its a bad one haha . Because the minimum wage is not what the government thinks you need . It’s the minimum they think an employer should pay . For your argument to work it would need to be a maximum wage . “That” would indicate they think it’s all you “need” ;):)
 
Metal God said:
I understand your point , I just think its a bad one haha . Because the minimum wage is not what the government thinks you need . It’s the minimum they think an employer should pay . For your argument to work it would need to be a maximum wage . “That” would indicate they think it’s all you “need”
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At an intuitive level, I don't understand how outlawing low wage employment helps people whose work is has a low market value. Making marginally productive people unemployable doesn't help them, but does set them up to become state dependents.

If one admits that the government should have the power to prohibit what you earn (either very low or very high), which firearms you can possess without due process, what you can say or hear and when you can say it or hear it, that grants government an enormous power to manipulate people and is hardly consistent with the idea of a limited government the powers of which are enumerated.

44AMP said:
Therefore, every penny you make, over and above minimum wage should be taken by the govt (banned) since you don't NEED IT!!

Somehow, no one ever seems to agree with that....
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One of the grotesque powers the IRS has involves deeming your compensation for a position excessive and taxing the excess as a gift.

There is a cultural shift away from "I disagree with what you say, but I'll fight to the death for your right to say it" and more toward "Speech doesn't include [a poorly defined] hate speech".

Part of that cultural shift makes news consumption more difficult in that a news outlet may not feel obliged to give a fair shake to ideas it regards unfavorably.
 
I can’t say it any plainer then minimum wage is not about the individual . Its about the company . Companies are regulated all the time and some regulations are good . We had a lot more planes falling out of the sky before regulations force them to conduct more rigorous maintenance procedures . Now it’s relatively unheard of in the United States .

That was my joking point about drinking the Kool-Aid . Minimum wage has been Referred to as a living wage now for so long people forget what it’s actually about . It’s The same difference when it comes gun control , We have Conceded the linguistic Highground for so long that the general public believes everything the anti’s say because they just re-define what words mean in the middle of arguments and we say OK .
 
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Metal god said:
Because the minimum wage is not what the government thinks you need . It’s the minimum they think an employer should pay .
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Metal god said:
I can’t say it any plainer then minimum wage is not about the individual . Its about the company .
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Regardless of whether the minimum wage is about the individual or about the company, if the minimum wage isn't supposed to be a livable wage (for the individual), why does the government impose that requirement on companies? I'd like to understand why you think this is the case.
 
I already did in a earlier post , the same reason china has their slave labor . Because when people are desperate they’ll work for anything and companies will take advantage of that . I talked in pretty good detail about that above to include my experiences 30 years ago and seeing companies paying people that were desperate less than minimum wage under the table . It’s been going on since the beginning of time .
 
yes, hungry people will do anything to "fill the rice bowl".

That's irrelevant.

you're focusing on a tree and its bark when we're talking about the forest...

The point is, its not what the standard is, its that someone other than you sets the standard you have to live to, and the idea that anything other than that standard is something that someone else (the govt in this case) controls, and if they so desire, forbids to you and I.

The entire "nobody needs ...(what ever it is) and therefore the Govt should not allow us to have it (ban it) is just BARKING WRONG, in my opinion.

But, it not only seems to be the way the world is working today, its something a lot of people are demanding....as long as its not their personal ox being gored....

Couple years back, there was a new "high powered energy drink" being sold here. Half a dozen high school kids, at a college Frat Party, OD'd on the drink and booze. Two died.

the Govt response was to ban the sale of that drink.

Ignoring the other factors that were involved entirely.....

I don't think that was the correct response...
 
My point was clear and narrow in scope . Using minimum wage to back up your argument about the government saying you only need , is a bad one . I stated why clearly IMHO and don’t really have anything to add to that .
 
I am sick of all the BIG networks, even FOX. All have got a brainwashing agenda behind almost every story. Trump put out a speech tonight and he showed a lot of evidence for election fraud to get it to the public. Then NBC talks about Trumps speech as if it was filled with false baseless allegations...blah, blah, blah, don't want to hear their nonsense anymore after 4 years of false news stories. Watch the local news for the weather forecast, then watch SKY news, OAN, NTD and select FOX offerings for national and world news. I've been watching a lot of Dan Bongino lately. The election news we are being fed from mainstream sources is B.S. I was watching the Michigan hearings today and that nasty black woman from Detroit was trying to intimidate the timid Indian lady testifying about fraud demanding she spell her name and wanting to know who she was like a mob boss who was going to put a hit out on her. I believe we have a democrat conspiracy to steel this election from Trump. Biden is the least exciting presidential candidate in history and he admitted live on TV that they had the most extensive inclusive voter fraud operation in history but we are supposed to believe that he just misspoke but that his befuddled brain is sharp as a tack the rest of the time he reads a prepared statement from a tele prompter. Trump isn't just spoofing when he speaks. He bugs a lot of people because he has the facts on his side. The closer he is to truth, the louder his opponents complain about how crazy he is.
 
Many people believe what they want to believe, regardless of any facts to the contrary. It's called deception.
Politics makes for very strange bedfellows indeed.
 
I was looking forward to some heavy Kraken action this week, but maybe later. These things take time, and I think the two big days are Dec 8 and 14 for deadlines for some sort.

"I am sick of all the BIG networks, even FOX. All have got a brainwashing agenda behind almost every story."

I agree. Thanks to them, and google, facebook, and twitter, most US citizens know nothing about the Hunter Biden hard drive and all that. That story was not allowed, and they used their "fact checking" excuse to justify it. And worse than that, the FBI has had it since 2019. Things are screwed up when the FBI and CIA are against the POTUS.

I do hope the Kraken shows up and chews some serious butt.
 
I think this one has drifted far enough from the kind of specific focus we like to keep in L&CR. Thanks for staying civil, everyone.
 
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