The explosion of illigitimacy should be no surprise. When you pay farmers to grow tobacco, we produce more cigarettes. When you pay people to reproduce, they respond enthusistically. Our goverment has established a large industry that produces children in fatherless homes. In fact, if an unmarried mother seeking aid tells the social worker the name of the childs father, she will get little assistance. If she says she has no idea who the father is, she will get a housing subsidy, Aid to Familys with Dependent Children, food stamps, welfare, WIC and free healthcare.

I'm not suggesting that support from fatherless children be withdrawn, just defining the root of the problem.

I don't come here to read Mul's rantings or to impress folks with my obvious brilliance or to be called a baby-killing, America-hating elitist. I come here for these kinds of discussion. I think we're not that far off in our hopes for society. Rodeo points out that overgeneralizations and criticisms are easy to spew, and that when it comes time to roll up our sleeves and actually design a program that moves us toward our shared vision, things don't look as simple as they did before. Criticisms are easi to assemble. Defenses are more difficult and implementations are murder.

My solution? Mandatory DNA paternity testing for all single mothers seeking public aid. All fathers will have child support deducted from wages automatically. If the fathers are unemployed, they will be given work by the county. (Yes, we need a new WPA.)

Mothers who are unable or unwilling to identify the fathers of their children will work for the county or be trained to provide daycare for other needy children while their mothers are at work.

No child should go without food, shelter and education. No aid should be provided to able bodied parents without compensatory work.

I wasn't suggesting that Moses wanted to cut off support for the woman (girl) in my example .... I'm interested in exploring where to draw the line between "unable" and "unwilling."

I agree that if someone is unwilling to do anything to help themselves, they are entitled to nothing from society. Let them do it themselves, since they are "able" to. But 2 issues arise:

1. How to define unwilling, and
2. what to do about the kids of the "unwilling"

Maybe that's a more accurate test of lib vs. conservative beliefs -- how one draws these lines. Maybe conservatives more readily label someone "unwilling," whereas libs believe more are "unable."

On Moses' note.
My brother in law recently had a family of three from the hurricane disaster area come live with them in Virginia. His local Catholic church was providng funds for them and Chris provided a room in his house. The man got a job as a cook at a local restaurant and I am not sure what the woman did, beyond care for her child. This lasted for about a month. In the end the man quit the job because he preferred spending time playing video games. There was friction between them and Chris's family and they moved out. It turns out the man is not the husband, she is not married. When asked why she isn't marrried, she replied that the benefits from the state are better that way. They are now in a hotel paid for by Red Cross.

We do need a better system. What that is, I don't know. Now we reward behavior that is detrimental to them and our society.

Sup,
I do not presume everything is determined. I believe in free will. It is just that someone's ability to exercise options under free will may be self limiting by innate traits. Environment may strengthen or weaken those traits.

And yes, you phrased my main concern about how we treat them quite well, thank you.

You need not despair! Your local WPA has a job for you! You'll get 6 weeks off after you deliver your baby like every other working mother, then it's back to work!

I think the WPA idea has some merit to it. There may be negative feedback from those whose jobs will be threatened. But I think society would be better off with a system that did not reward behavior that undermines the innate trait of humans to better themselves.

Moses, we posted at the same time, my immediate reaction to your plan is "bring money."

Very expensive program you just designed. The county will have to first identify, then find, then pay the father a lot of $$$ to support himself and the mother and the kids. The county will likely hire him over someone more qualified. Is that fair? Father a child, abandon the child, get a government job?

And how do I get that guy to actually work? What if he does not show up? What if he shows up but is useless? Jail?

If we can't find the father, we hire the mother. More $$$. Then we pay for her kids to get care while she works. Then we of course hire her over other applicants, or fire someone to make room for her ...

Sorry, I don't know any of these answers, but I raise the questions to show how complex these things are. There's a hundred more issues I have not raised.

Ths biggest problem with political thought in America today, in my view, is that people actually believe they can solve everything with a 3 minute phone call to a radio talk show. Just rant about how easy it would be if the politicians were not so stupid, corrupt, etc. etc.

Here is the difference between a conservative and "liberal". I put liberal in quotes as decades ago we aquired a skewed perceptive of the word. Anyway, you fel it is societies responsibility, I on teh other hand, feel it is the individuals responsibility. Not neccisarily though in need of help, but tose individuals capable of rendering it around them.

This one almost strike home in my case. My Dad never wento school for what he is doing now, just started and learned. My Grandad was one of the keys to Satelite TV, my Uncle is key to the GPS program. Trave it far enough, and you find German nobility pre 30 years war. (Gave it up rather then be responsible for more bloodshead betwen the protestants afterwards). I could however also find families that the oppsiite is true, that there was distinct change. Its not genetics, two clones can come out very differently. My older brother and I are very different. Genetics can help determine physical atributes, but they do not solely make up a person.

I cannot realy explain this, other then that I've come to notice that each set of parents reguardless of what the liberal or conservative would consider "success", set foth a "right/wrong" that was distinctive to their children, and raised them to do right regaurdless of the consequences. Some strayed away, others followed that advice.

Each one of us has a capiblity to exceed far what we are worth or ever deserve, most chose to refuse it. And spit on the opportunity given. I'm not talking financial here. Life in general. You can be rich and almost driven mad, and poor and almos driven mad, its your choice how you chose to deal with what has been given to you.

I'm getting to the age where I'm starting to look for a girl. I'm different, most look for likes/dislikes. I've come to realise that what is more important, is actions and reactions. How does on react to not being able to do something they wanted? Do they go on hapily, or do they ake time out to rant/pout? To me, the situations are not as important, as the reactions to them.

Oh, btw steve, I ahve worked in a "soup kitchen" handing out food in a very poor area of town before.

Everywhere "workfare" programs have been used, welfare enrollment drops dramatically. Money saved.

DNA testing is about $50. Money recaptured in first week of mandatory child support.

Daycare costs? Perhaps, but the labor is free, provided by other women requesting public assistance.

Father refuses to work? Labor camp. Very few would choose that option.

I'm with you in concept, but I think you will find in reality that its a lot more complex than you have laid out, I think so much so that it's unworkable. "Workfare," which I am in favor of, uses private employers for the most part. And workfare is not a perfect system by any stretch of the imagination.

If anyone wants to know what it is like at the very bottom of our society, at least in New York City, pick up a book called "Random Family." You cannot read that book, a chronicle of life in the South Bronx over a period of years, and believe that there are easy solutions to America's welfare/class problems.

So you propose to "stay the course" because solutions are too complex? I would suggest that solutions are in reality quite simple. Poverty is more widespread and more oppressive now than before president Johnson embarked on our 7 trillion dollar "Great Society" failure.

Goverment has made fathers obsolete. Having the father in the home places a poor family in serious financial jeopardy. Yeah, that makes sense.

The fundamental principles of public assistance should be extremely simple; 1) Paternity is an absolute and irrevocable financial commitment. 2) Public assistance should not be given to able citizens without compensatory labor. Pretty damn simple.

Scene from the year 2010, after the "Moses Workfare" plan takes effect.

The setting: a McDonalds in any city or town in America:

Man 1 (to a McDonald’s worker): Dude, why you working here?

Man 2: Couldn't find nothing better. It's a job, you know?

Man 1: Why don't you just leave your wife and kids, stop paying support?

Man 2: I'm not doin' that! They’re my family!

Man 1: You don't understand! If you leave her and stop paying support, the county will give you a job! A good job!

Man 2: Huh?

Man 1: Yea dude, its the new Moses welfare plan. If you don't support your kids, they give you a county job, and enough pay to not only support yourself but your wife and kids too! All you have to do is STOP SUPPORTING THEM for a while. They'll come get you and give you a job! A good one too! You don’t even have to work that hard.

Man 2; You’re crazy!

Man 1: I tried to get on the county payroll for years, no luck until I walked out on my girl and my kids! Look at me now!

Man 2: I quit!

:) :) :) :) :)

Rodeo, respectfully, if you really don't get it, it's because you don't want to. Have you never heard of the WPA?

Your "McDonalds" exchange is absurd.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Works_Progress_Administration

"The WPA built 650,000 miles of roads, 78,000 bridges, 125,000 buildings, and seven hundred miles of airport runways... It presented 225,000 concerts to audiences totalling 150 million, and produced almost 475,000 works of art. Even today, almost sixty years after it ceased to exist, there is no part of America that does not bear some mark of the WPA."

My humorous attempt to point out that your plan has a massive incentive, in the form of a government job (with benefits!), for anyone that refuses to support their kids. If you don't like the current economic incentive to have fatherless homes (I agree by the way), think about the incentives you are creating with your government employment plan.

The WPA was voluntary. It was for people that WANTED jobs, not people content with government handouts. To solve our welfare problem we need to address the people that would rather sit home all day and collect a government check, not the people that want jobs.

It was voluntary if you wanted to eat.

A WPA job would never compete with a private sector job. Not even McDonalds. It would offer only very basic assistance.

At this point we should be discussing if public assistance should be provided without obligation from the recipient. THAT is the question.

That would require a massive outlay of resources and money, because already you can't address in the general or through programs, each individual resolved to sit and collect a govt check. Addressing these individuals (to get them off welfare) has to be more of a one-on-one counseling session. Even then, there's no certainty that would work. Entire generations have been based on collecting welfare. It's like a drug addiction.

So how else might welfare get resolved? Easy. Dismantle it. Take the drug from the addict.

By all accounts, WPA is a great program as it empowers the individual to put themselves back on track. The only problem I see with it is that it is only a voluntary program. It should be mandatory. But I'm sure that will be argued as "unconstitutional."

Ok, I feel bad we took this discussion pretty far afield. That's the thing with policy, it's not simple. You can have simple concepts guiding you – assistance should come with obligations is a good guiding principle – but the actual design is work. Hard work. Not to mention the implementation of the policy once you decide what it is.

Making a government work is more than guiding principles. I bet 90% of us would agree on those. Putting to principles to work is where rubber meets the road :)

Bless you! Someone "gets it!"

Ok, maybe I'm dense. What's the difference between the WPA and, say, Microsoft? Both are sources of jobs for people that want jobs. In both cases, in order to become employed someone needs the incentive to get their kids taken care of and go apply for a job.

Are you suggesting that if we create a WPA all those people on welfare will suddenly be clamoring for a WPA job? How is a massive, new, voluntary public employment program going to solve the welfare issue?

I beleive when it was originated, the massive welfare orginization was not yet in existance.

Another consideration, not a deal breaker but a consideration, is the impact this would have on the economy. One of the balances that has needed to be struck in my state is the type and volume of work that should be done by prison inmates. Our prison system could pay them $0.01 per hour, and have them working asbestos abatement contracts all over the state. That would eliminate private asbestos abatement contractors.

A program that builds 650,000 miles of roads, 78,000 bridges, 125,000 buildings, and seven hundred miles of airport runways would be doing hundreds of billions of dollars of commercial business that would otherwise be done by local general contractors, using law-abiding citizens who also have children and those construction workers' private-sector construction wages (attractive) would be lost to the economy.

Yeah, we could do what Moses says, and we're all for accountability and work in exchange for assistance, but what size would gubmint be if all the unlucky and lazy folks worked under these programs? And what impact would that have on our economies? You guys normally argue that the red-hot furnace of private enterprize is what keeps taxes DOWN and ingenuity up and causes sin and misfortune to disappear and leads to wealth and prosperity for everyone. Here you are talking about hosing that fire.

Work would be MANDATORY for those requiring public assistance. There is NO PAYCHECK! The work is compensation for the public aid received. Got it?

Labor intensive work that we cannot otherwise afford to do could be done. In depressed areas of the inner city, graffitti can be painted over, trees can be planted. Business owners could repaint/repair shops in depressed area with WPA work. For those with the aptitude, daycare centers can be staffed for poor working women. Litter can be cleared. Not all WPA projects compete with private enterprise. In my opinion, the economic and social gains far outweigh the continued cost of doing "business as usual".

SoCal: LOL!! That was a priceless post man...made my day.:D

I agree with the Moses plan. Totally dismantle welfare and recognize it for the massive social disaster that it is. I cannot fathom how people continue to support a program that encourages people to not work, have multiple children which they likely cannot care for, bonuses if the father has left the house, and penalties for working a minimum wage job.

There are all sorts of things that the WPA workers could be doing, here's a thought...how about the jobs that are currently being done by illegal immigrants??:eek:

Seems like a match made in heaven to me, take out the demand for illegal immigrants by providing low cost workers to employers to do a trade whether it be construction, farming, metalworking, etc. and provide a tradeskill learning venue for those who have no tradeskills.

I think that although Steve has stepped into a bit of a hornet's nest with the genetics comments (which I am sure he doesn't REALLY mean), he still is embodying the "prototypical" liberal in that people who do not succeed are not at fault in his mind, they were dealt a bad hand or society didn't support them enough. It's all back to the victim culture where you don't have any responsibility for your own future because the cards are stacked against you.

I keep waiting for a liberal to realize that the very programs that they espouse and think help the poor in fact perpetuate their poverty and assure their persistence in the lower class income bracket.

You seem to have very little tolerance for "details," and since we are talking about details, I'll guess just drop it. You want anyone that receives any kind of assistance to work for it.

I want a car that handles well, is a fast as my Porsche, and costs less.

I "got" both of those things, but I'll need a few details to make either of them a reality.

SoCal is clearly not having the same discussion that everyone else is having. If I say my two daughters are very different from each other, is he going to hit the CAP LOCK KEY and shout about how absurd it is to conclude that females are genetically predisposed to being different?

Get off whatever accusation is clouding your remarks, or at least perhaps ask a question or two about it. Your remarks seem to have something to do with class warfare or something, I can't quite figure out what it is. Everyone else seems to be simply making the observation that folks' destinies seem to be tied in to their innate predispositions (genetics, having nothing to do with race or class warfare or anything else except randomness) combined with what their environment teaches them.

BTW, if it were that simple, don't you think poverty in America would be non-existent? You think we have a welfare system that doesn't work because people actually want it that way? Or because they are too dumb to "get" your three-sentence solution to a problem that has perplexed us for decades?

No wonder there is such a gap between libs and conservatives ... if I truly believed the issue of welfare was so easy to solve, I'd be frustrated too!

I believe the WPA was around during a time that, as one person mentioned, was before the "welfare" system. It was also before unemployment payments for the unemployed.

Perhaps irrelevant to this debate:
My great uncle was one of the unemployed millions in depression-era America. He went to work in the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) which was one of the WPA programs. While in the CCC, he received education and wages - both of which he needed. Nearly 75% of his money went to help support his family. When WWII came along, he became a decorated paratrooper in the European theater.

Personally, I applaud those who would abolish our current welfare system. I would support a "work-fare" system. I think it's a very simple choice to make: If you work, you get paid. You may even learn some new skills to help you in your life. If you don't want to work, then nobodys going to force you... but you aren't going to get paid to sit on your ass. I really see no constitutional infringement or inhumanity in a policy such as that. I do see hand-out programs as a socially disabling policy.

And that's really the point. The money spent on welfare is trivial compared to the social devastation that it brings.

How about this. The old guy at Kragen is working there because he is bored. He does not need the money, because he worked from the time he was 14 until he was 60 for the same company, and makes more now than he did when he was working. He has no bills, because he was frugal and did not live beyond his means, paid his house and vehicles off and is set for life. This describes my father-in-law, a hardcore southern democrat, who is as conservative as my ex-wife is fat and lazy.

It is impossible to differentiate those unable to work from those that are unwilling. I like all the WPA and CCC ideas. If I am feeding, housing and dressing them, they should at least pick up some trash by the side of the road.

Just to stir the pot a bit. While I agree that there are individuals more capable than others, I would not agree that even a below average person is incapable of supporting themself. Even if they are not too bright, or physically gifted, most are able to work. It is not a coincidence that hardworking people are lucky enough to be financially successful.

A conservative will tell someone, I know you can do better, I want to make you better able to take care of yourself.

A liberal will say, you are doing the best you are able to do, here is a check.

Schizophrenia. If you accept the original premise, everything that follows makes perfect sense. If you can accept that we are being monitored by aliens, the tin foil hat and searching for signals on a broken transistor radio seems kind of reasonable.

In a similar way, if you accept a fundamental tenet of liberalism; That most people cannot be expected to take care of themselves, then all the social projects make perfect sense. We need welfare. We need rehab on request. We need counselling. We need limitless support. It all makes sense.

Rick,
No, I meant the genetices, traits distribuiton remarks.
I just leave it open that they may have had traits which did not enable them to succeed, but I do not presume that is the case for all. To say it isn't so, defies logic. How can you have great successes on one side because of innate traits and then truncate the distribution curve on the other side?

My thrust was to perhaps alter one's view on such a person. You seem to display the view that everyone can make it, it's all up to them. You know that is not possible.

On current programs, yes, they have dimished the innate trait to be self sufficient and that is wrong. It is not good to have families on welfare continually and onto the next generation.

Huh...well I would argue that YES, it is possible for ANYONE to make it in this country. I mean that. Anyone. There are plenty of examples if you open your eyes.

There is a bell shaped curve in this country, but I argue that the curve measures hard work and determination, not some sort of genetic ability or lack thereof. Those who succeed work their butts of for it, those who sit on those collective butts never get anywhere.

Not only that, I would argue that it is demeaning and downright supressive to suggest that the poor in this country can never make it no matter how hard they try. That kind of thinking creates a permanent lower class with no incentive to try and succeed at all. Perhaps that is what the Democrats really want...a never ending voter base. To hell with the actual people, they're genetically inferior anyways.

Wow. That is one warped view of liberalism. I don't think you would find a single liberal that would agree with that "fundamental tenet of liberalism."

No wonder you are angry. You think the people on the other side of the aisle are blithering idiots. Wow.

I agreed with your basic premise that people capable of working should work as a condition of government assistance, yet you were not interested or capable of discussing how that principle could be implemented. Now I know why.

You were asking for a detailed blueprint which I haven't the time or inclination to provide.

When you said, "I agreed with your basic premise that people capable of working should work as a condition of government assistance." That was good enough for me. In essence, we agree. I am happy to let folks brighter than me work out the details.

And for the record, I am neither angry nor conservative. By every objective measure I am a liberal/libertarian. In the same way that many Republicans have betrayed the principles of financial conservatism, many Democrats have abandoned the principles of common sense when discussing welfare reform.

Rick, I suggest you have made the protoypical conservative reponse.
Given your assumptions, your concusions are correct.

Socal, if that's all your reading here, then that's all you'll find.

Steve, which assumptions have I made that you have not specifically stated in this thread?

Jeez Steve, the only responses to any opposing views you're giving basically say:

"yep, just what a Republican would believe"

You neither defend or reinforce your point. You're neither deep nor intellectually superior.

Quite trollish, I dare say.

I hate liberals and conservatives, both of them lie, cheat, and steal.