What does the US do with the other half?

Yes, it is nice to celebrate the strength of the economy.

 

If I may, I'll jump in here.

I'm a centrist Democrat. I believe in the 2nd amendment right to keep and bear arms - but with what I believe are sensible background checks to keep guns away from legitimate mental cases and violent felons (those convicted of violent crimes).

I am also a Christian, am pro-life, but it isn't my only consideration when voting. My wife and I thank GOD for our kids & would NOT consider abortion.

I've worked in a technical profession for over 40 years in big construction. No one gave me ANYTHING. I worked for every penny I have. Same with my wife.

I believe the global science community that we're in a crisis of climate change, at an accelerated rate that defies the usual changes that happen over thousands of years - not 100 or so. We only have this ONE earth - it's our ONLY HOME. If we pollute it to oblivion, where do we think we're going?? (For the Bible-thumping, yelling Evangelicals and all other Christian folks, how proud of us do you think GOD is for trashing the home HE gave us??) We're the only animal on the planet that ruins it's home. For what?? .............. Money, quicker profits, less regulations on air & water pollution, etc.

I believe that EVERY WORKER has rights to stand up for themselves, organize into unions, and negotiate collectively for wages, benefits, and safe workplaces. Since the workers are the ones ACTUALLY DOING THE WORK - especially very highly skilled jobs and professions, we deserve more of the financial pie than seeing the vast amount of the profits go to executives. (which has been the case for decades - while the ACTUAL WORKERS struggle to make ends meet.) (See The Bible for "greed - one of the 7 DEADLY SINS" ).

As it relates to the above point - workers need to give "8 for 8" - meaning a good 8 hours work for 8 hours pay. NO SCREWING OFF and milking a job. If everyone adheres to this principal, we all make money. Overtime worked needs to be compensated at 1 1/2 times regular pay, because workers are forced to spend more time away from their families - and kids don't raise themselves, right?? (see "family values, core family" chants by REPUBLICAN PARTY).

I believe that everyone who has paid into Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid through payroll taxes is entitled .......... YES ENTITLED ......... to get what the U.S.A. has pledged to them from the 1940's. The money came off our paychecks - so YES we ARE ENTITLED to get it back. (401-K's are NOT guaranteed by the FDIC or any other government agency .......... so you could end up penniless).

I believe every U.S. citizen has the RIGHT to good healthcare. U.S. citizens BUILT this country to what it is today, so they deserve to be taken care of when sick or injured. It wasn't built by a few "upper crust" folks all by themselves!!! Health care should NEVER be a luxury only afforded by the richest in our country. (see The Bible for "love thy neighbor as thyself ", Good Samaritan, etc.)

I believe in the U.S. Constitution, which sets up 3 co-equal branches of government ........... NOT a one person dictatorship or monarchy. The 3 branches are to serve as checks and balances on each other so to avoid a one-party or one person rule. (remember the Colonial patriots were escaping the British monarchy where King George had ALL the power, ALL the say, and almost ALL the wealth of England.)

I believe we need an independent way to re-district the whole country, so NEITHER PARTY can take ABSOLUTE CONTROL of all our elections. That way we get an honest tally of how the whole of the citizenry wants the country to go forward. TRUTH and HONESTY above all. It's the ONLY WAY our country survives as we know it.

I think that if you're an elected person in the U.S. - if you get caught doing something illegal - NO SPECIAL treatment. A crook is a crook is a crook - Republican, Democrat, Independent, Green Party, ANY PARTY. There ought to be a minimum period of JAIL time for any elected representatives who break the law. Elected people should be held to a higher standard because they are there to SERVE THE PEOPLE after being given the public's trust. No exceptions. Maybe that'll stop some of the crap that's been going on by ALL PARTIES for too long. If no oversight and penalties on elected people - then can we do away with bank security cameras too?? Security guards??? Does that sound like a good idea to anyone??

My opinion - if we want to encourage people to invest in our country's businesses - as a means to secure their futures financially - then create incentives tax-wise to save and invest. Don't hammer people on dividends and interest from investments. If people still choose to piss away their money on silly, ill-chosen things .............. that's on them. They bear the responsibility.

PUT FINANCIAL EDUCATION / PERSONAL FINANCE / INVESTMENT into every school curriculum. With good, accurate education in terms of money management, many more people will secure themselves for their futures, rainy days, etc. I self-educated from my senior year in high school about investments of all sorts. We didn't have that in school, so I taught myself. Thankfully, it paid off well - but it took a lot of reading and comparing sources of info. Better to make money with the brain than the back!!

I'm NOT in favor of "welfare suckers". Every description of a Democrat seems to think we all want to just give away money for nothing. NO!! I believe that if anyone is getting welfare, they ought to be assigned jobs to do that will benefit the community. Maybe it's being a crossing guard for school kids, or a classroom helper in a school, or work in a food bank. Sadly - we have in this country (because of pitifully low wages in many jobs) people who work full-time and can't feed their families on poverty-pay levels, so they NEED food stamps and such just to get by.

I think the whole business / financial system in the U.S. need to be re-worked. After reading in John Bogle's books and articles where he said that the corporate system in the U.S. is ...... rigged so the lion's share of the profits go to the top executives .......... Bogle's words - not mine - and there isn't enough corporate governance to reign-in executive greed, I believe we need to re-vamp the SEC and curtail runaway corporate greed. Thankfully, some CEO's are of the same mind, as they've voiced taking better care of their workforces as a way forward for success. Some have even said that "shareholders can't be our only focus." So some of the tide may be changing .......... but too slowly.

I don't know how to convince others who WILL NOT EVEN CONSIDER another point of view, have their blinders on, only watch / listen to the screaming, foaming-at-the-mouth radical right media, or vote a certain way because "that's how Mom & Dad voted." If we stop calling each other names and threatening violence, we might be able to make the country better. Maybe think of what we're leaving our kids / grandkids?????

Basically - bottom line .......... I'm all about HONESTY and FAIRNESS.

 

term limits across the board
REMOVE politics as a CAREER choice

 

I couldn't care less..since many of them don't believe in mask wearing lets quarrantine in someplace desolate and lacking in transportation out. Since they don't believe in taxes they can figure out how to take care of themselves. No reason to waste resources on em. Not very much in the spirit of hippie ethos, but hey, no one is perfect.

 

And there it is the "crux of the biscuit" so to speak , when both side have a caviler or lackadaisical ideology and neither willing to give or care

 

Oh, I have a very clear ideology, it's just that I prefer not to use violence unless attacked first. These people, who supported an administration that ripped children from the arms of parents, incarcerated and deported people merely for no being u.s. citizens, supported an administration that used the propaganda techniques of Gobbels (sic) and relished chanting "lock her up" regarding a congress women from Minnesota, should all be locked in cages for the rest of there lives. I have no concern for people that spread or tolerate this type of thing, and refraining from acting out violently against them is all the compassion I care to extend them. If after reading this you conclude I don't care you seriously don't understand what I do care about. These idiots like deportation? Let's deport everyone of em to any, how did their leader put it "shit hole country" that will accept them.

 

2 wrongs still do not make right

 

We now have a former general of our armed forces calling for a shooting civil war. Putin and Xi must have never-ending hard-ons. So many in this country are just sooooo F-in' stupid. There is NO POLITE WORD for it.

Some of the Trump LEMMING dolts don't even know how the U.S. Constitution set up 3 branches of our government. I've heard with my own ears - some of these idiots say, "The President runs the country - period. Congress and the courts should stay the F out of it." - - - Sounds like some of these geniuses didn't listen while in school. Do they want a monarchy again ...... like the U.S. was formed to reject?? Do they want a dictator like Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Pol-Pot, and others of that same slime?? A letter-to-the-editor in a newspaper from one of these empty-heads said this, "Keep your Goddamn big government hands off my Social Security." That idiot didn't even realize that if it weren't for that "big government" - he wouldn't HAVE ANY Social Security. No clue as to how he even GETS Social Security - or where his checks come from, and who's responsible for creating those Social Security checks in the first place.

Many of these LEMMINGS need to go back to school ............. and pay attention this time. ( or maybe TRUTH-BEARING books have been taken out of schools by THE REPUBLICAN PARTY, as they have already begun, trying to re-write history.)

This is the level of mentality of many of these dolts. As the saying goes ............ you can't fix STUPID.

 

I agree. California has term limits on state offices, i.e. mayors, governor, state senate, and assembly. What can't the feds follow suit? The way it is now, a California state representative can be termed out, but then run for a seat in Congress, and if he wins, be there forever.

 

They have don much more then two wrongs and tearing screaming babies from the arms of their parents is the type of thing Nazis did in concentration camps. I want nothing to do with these bigots. If you care for em so much you go make nice with em. It appears you'll get your wish cause Biden too wants to reconcile. But I don't have to like it and wish that all the things they supported having government do to immigrants is given back to them ten fold.

 

"Aint no time to hate" good luck with all your anger

 

The nightmare that was the Trump administration is over.

Not only will those children be reunited with their parents, but the families will likely be offered citizenship by the Biden Administration
because of the pain and trauma they went through.

 

I doubt it.
According to Pew Research, 44% of the electorate voted Republican. 80-85% of those support Trump. Their strong electoral showing suggests that a large plurality of America voted Republican not in spite of everything that's transpired over the last four years, but because of it. 82% believe that Biden stole the election and that his administration is illegitimate. 56% of Republicans believe that QAnon, a far-right conspiracy theory, is mostly or partly true. QAnon posits that "elites", particularly Democrats, are secretly a Satanic cult sex trafficking children, murdering them to extract a fictitious substance they call "adenochrome"...and then eating them. Lately the QAnon cult has been assimilating anti-maskers, anti-vaxxers, and neo-Fascist militia groups. How do you engage with people who literally believe that we're all pedophiles, child murderers, and cannibals? 36% of Republicans believe political violence is justified in advancing their agenda, and 31% of US voters believe “it’s likely that the United States will experience a second civil war sometime in the next five years.”
As much as I grieve the Balkanization of America, if people can make common cause with the Klan, neo-Confederates, neo-Fascist militias, Brownshirt street gangs, and the American Taliban, by default they cannot consider me to be an ally; far too many of my friends and family are in the gunsights of theirs. Somehow we have to collectively find some common ground upon which to rebuild communal relationships, but that's so hard to see when one side sees compromise as capitulation and seeks total domination, and we can't even agree upon what constitutes a shared objective reality.

 

I'm only too familiar with those wing-nuts and their whacky tinfoil hat conspiracy theories, but this a time to rejoice.

Although they made gains in the house, and we'll see about the Senate, the defeat of Donald Trump was crushing
and something they'll never get over.

 

Don't bet on it. He's talking about running for reelection in 2024; while that might be fantasy, it's a very lucrative fantasy; he's fund-raised over $200 million since loosing the election. If he can dodge jail, he'll have the money and the support of a rabid, fanatical, and deeply aggrieved cult following to lob an endless barrage of bombs; continuing to subvert our democracy, promote political violence and insurrection, and shred the last vestiges of our common communal bonds.
Trump isn't even our main problem. The Republicans are already planning how to sabotage the incoming administration, create as much suffering as possible, and blame it all on the Democrats at the next midterms.
Mitch McConnell's Plan to Sabotage Biden's Presidency Begins in Earnest

 

Salon is so far left I cant take them serious
Salon - Media Bias/Fact Check
Salon Media Bias | AllSides
Home of the Media Bias Chart - Ad Fontes Media Version 5.0

I prefer NON BIASED factual reporting

 

Your preferences are none of my concern.

 

Maybe if we get lucky they try to rise up in arms and find out very quickly that their second amendment remedies are no match for armoured vehicles and armed FBI swat teams. Those that survive can do so in lock down in a federal prison. Not the most hippie sentiment, but Jesus only said to turn the other cheek, not what to do after they slap a second time...

 

my preferences maybe not, however UNBIASED news should certainly be EVERYONES concern