One Political Plaza - Home of politics
Home Active Topics Newest Pictures Search Login Register ☰
Main
No, Red State Economies Don't Depend on a "Gravy Train" from Blue State
Page 1 of 2 next>
Feb 24, 2023 16:29:21   #
AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State
 
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont-depend-gravy-train-blue-states

No, Red State Economies Don't Depend on a "Gravy Train" from Blue States
Ryan McMaken

When Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called (again) for "national divorce" this week, a common retort among her detractors on Twitter was to claim that so-called red states are heavily dependent on so-called blue states to pay for pretty much everything. Reporter Molly Knight claimed, for example, that "Red states get their money for roads and cops and schools from blue states. You cut off that gravy train and you e [sic] got a third world country."

twitt
Others claimed that red states would be "entirely broke" without blue states. America's social democrats have apparently fully gone over to pushing the narrative that the "red states" are poor and backward while the "blue states" are productive and economically sophisticated.

tw
The implication here is that red states would never survive any sort of separation from the blue states because the red states would then miss out on the presumably large amounts of free money.

Unfortunately for these critics, the data doesn't really back them up. While it is certainly true that a handful of red states receive much more in federal spending than their residents pay in federal taxes, this is not at all the situation across most red states. This is especially not the case in states with states with larger metropolitan areas such as Florida and Texas.

The real story is more complicated, and to see the details, we can look at state-by-state comparisons in terms of "return on taxes paid." This is a measure of how much each state receives in federal spending for every dollar extracted in federal taxes. States with a "return" above one dollar are getting back more than their residents paid in federal taxes. Residents in a state with a "return" below a dollar pay more than they receive.

To do this analysis, we start with the tax collections from each state, as reported by the Internal Revenue service. Then, we look at federal spending in each state. There are some smaller categories of spending that are difficult to track, but we can capture the overwhelming majority of federal spending in each state by looking at several key categories:

State revenues from federal intergovernmental t***sfers (2019).
Department of Defense spending by state (2019).
Federal share of Medicaid by state (2021).
Medicare spending by state (2019).
Social security spending (OASDI) by state1 (2021).
Once we add it all up we can see the "return on taxes paid" in graph form below:

return
By this analysis, the federal spending in Minnesota only amounted to 48 cents for every tax dollar extracted from the state. On the other hand, Mississippi received more than three dollars for every tax dollar paid by residents. Contrary to the idea that most red states are like Mississippi, however, we find that most states—both red and blue—are much closer to the middle on this. The states that are within a few cents of receiving a dollar for a dollar—i.e., "breaking even"—include the Dakotas, North Carolina, Nevada, Wisconsin, Missouri, Utah, Maryland, Kansas, and Florida. Meanwhile, California and Texas are approximately equal with each other, receiving about 80 cents in federal spending for every dollar paid by residents in taxes.

My findings here are similar to the study that was repeatedly sent to Rep. Greene by many of her scoffing critics. Specifically, Green was instructed to read this Moneygeek article which purportedly "proves" that the red states depend heavily on blue-state largesse to survive. Yet, with both our analysis here, and with the Moneygeek article, we will find that the characterization of red states as an economic drain on the country requires quite a bit of hyperbole.2

After "National Divorce": A Red State vs. Blue State Breakdown

Just how badly would red states fare if they were to break off from the blue states? Well, only a minority of these states would be "in the red" and get back significantly more than they pay in. 15 out of 27 red states are either net-tax-paying states or within a few cents of "breaking even." In other words, with the exception of states like Mississippi and West Virginia and Alabama, most of these states could realistically expect to be self-funding in case of a national break-up. Moreover, viewed as a single bloc, the red states' overall "return" on taxes paid is only $1.02. Were these states to become an independent region of their own, it would hardly be impossible to manage with current tax resources. In fact, if a "Red States of America" wanted to ensure available revenues exceeded current tax liabilities, the bloc could simply exclude the less productive states. If Mississippi and West Virginia don't bring much to the table, there's no immutable law of nature requiring the "Red States of America" to include them.

Some of the current net tax receiver states could also easily change their fortunes by simply splitting off the less productive areas such as southwest Alabama, western Mississippi, and eastern Kentucky. The blue states would surely be happy enough to have those areas as dependencies

How Much GDP Do the Red States Produce?

One other tactic used to portray the red states as a bunch of impoverished welfare queens is to claim that the overwhelming majority of the US's GDP is produced in the blue states. Again, this is a sizable exaggeration. Breaking out the blue and red states as we did above, we find that the blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. Specifically, the blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. In this scenario, a red state bloc would still have a GDP over $8 trillion and would have the world's third largest economy behind China and the "Blue States of America." It would have an economy larger than Germany, Japan, and India.

Looking at GDP per capita, we find the red state bloc would remain on a par with western Europe and Canada. If divided up, the blue states today would come in around $69,000 per capita. The red states would come in at about $55,000. Taken as two groups, this would place the blue states on a par with Denmark (at approximately $68,000), and the red states a little above Finland (at approximately $54,000).

Why Some States Are Net Taxpayers, and Some Aren't

Why do we have these large disparities among states? Federal tax revenues are driven heavily by the number of high-earning and full-time workers in each state. States with large numbers of retirees and elderly will thus produce less tax revenue while receiving more in federal spending. States with large low-income populations (relative to overall size) will receive a proportionally higher amount of federal spending. Thus, it's not surprising that Mississippi, with its large low-income population in the Delta region, is a net recipient of federal spending. Similarly, the population in West Virginia is relatively low-income and elderly. Neither of these states have notably large metropolitan areas to balance out these lower-income households. On the other hand, Florida, Texas, Utah, and Ohio have the productive metropolitan areas necessary to balance out populations of pensioners and the unemployed.

It should also be noted that when I say "metropolitan area" I don't mean "urban core." Activists on the Left often like to promote the idea that the most entrepreneurial, productive, and dynamic sectors of society are necessarily concentrated in urban cores. But the data does not show this. Rather "suburbanization" of both employment and labor is a longstanding trend, meaning that many sectors of the economy in recent decades have been decentralized out of the urban core, and each state's most productive centers are often found in the suburban counties—where political leanings are not at all necessarily "blue." Moreover, many of a state's most productive workers—engineers, medical personnel, entrepreneurs, financial workers, for example—choose to live in suburbs. Thus, the most productive states are often states with large sprawling suburban areas, and not necessarily "big cities" in the twentieth-century sense.

The Red States Would Survive

Rep. Greene's Twitter critics are clearly very enthusiastic about portraying Americans in red states as impoverished unsophisticated welfare queens unable to get by without wealth t***sfers from the blue states. It's a convenient narrative, although an inaccurate one. It is likely in most scenarios, however, that secession would come with short-term economic dislocations and disruptions. Yet, short-term economic troubles have never been an insurmountable obstacle to secession and revolution. The American revolutionaries, after all, voluntarily cut themselves off from trade and took on huge debts to achieve political independence. Short term economic realities also do not dictate long-term prospects. If a Red States of America embraced global trade and a reduced regulatory burden, it could expect to see its economy accelerate in the medium and longer term. Moreover, cultural issues often trump economic ones, and residents may be willing to sacrifice some amount of wealth (measurable in dollars) for the perceived advantages of political self-determination. Were red-state Americans given the option to secede in exchange for per capita GDP levels similar to those of Germany, I suspect that many would take that bargain.

1. I have taken the December 2021 spending totals and multiplied by 12 to get an approximate annual total. This gives us a plausible total of approximately $1.1 trillion across all states.
2. The chief problem with the Moneygeek analysis is that it attempts to partly define red state "dependence" on blue states in terms of federal distributions as a percentage of state revenues. This is a faulty type of analysis because this "dependence" ranking depends just as much on state tax levels as on federal spending, and the ranking thus penalizes states with low taxes. Given that state tax rates are fully within control of the state itself, a low-tax state is not actually "dependent" on federal funds since the state could raise taxes at any time without federal consent.





Reply
Feb 24, 2023 16:44:11   #
guzzimaestro
 
AuntiE wrote:
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont-depend-gravy-train-blue-states

No, Red State Economies Don't Depend on a "Gravy Train" from Blue States
Ryan McMaken

When Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called (again) for "national divorce" this week, a common retort among her detractors on Twitter was to claim that so-called red states are heavily dependent on so-called blue states to pay for pretty much everything. Reporter Molly Knight claimed, for example, that "Red states get their money for roads and cops and schools from blue states. You cut off that gravy train and you e [sic] got a third world country."

twitt
Others claimed that red states would be "entirely broke" without blue states. America's social democrats have apparently fully gone over to pushing the narrative that the "red states" are poor and backward while the "blue states" are productive and economically sophisticated.

tw
The implication here is that red states would never survive any sort of separation from the blue states because the red states would then miss out on the presumably large amounts of free money.

Unfortunately for these critics, the data doesn't really back them up. While it is certainly true that a handful of red states receive much more in federal spending than their residents pay in federal taxes, this is not at all the situation across most red states. This is especially not the case in states with states with larger metropolitan areas such as Florida and Texas.

The real story is more complicated, and to see the details, we can look at state-by-state comparisons in terms of "return on taxes paid." This is a measure of how much each state receives in federal spending for every dollar extracted in federal taxes. States with a "return" above one dollar are getting back more than their residents paid in federal taxes. Residents in a state with a "return" below a dollar pay more than they receive.

To do this analysis, we start with the tax collections from each state, as reported by the Internal Revenue service. Then, we look at federal spending in each state. There are some smaller categories of spending that are difficult to track, but we can capture the overwhelming majority of federal spending in each state by looking at several key categories:

State revenues from federal intergovernmental t***sfers (2019).
Department of Defense spending by state (2019).
Federal share of Medicaid by state (2021).
Medicare spending by state (2019).
Social security spending (OASDI) by state1 (2021).
Once we add it all up we can see the "return on taxes paid" in graph form below:

return
By this analysis, the federal spending in Minnesota only amounted to 48 cents for every tax dollar extracted from the state. On the other hand, Mississippi received more than three dollars for every tax dollar paid by residents. Contrary to the idea that most red states are like Mississippi, however, we find that most states—both red and blue—are much closer to the middle on this. The states that are within a few cents of receiving a dollar for a dollar—i.e., "breaking even"—include the Dakotas, North Carolina, Nevada, Wisconsin, Missouri, Utah, Maryland, Kansas, and Florida. Meanwhile, California and Texas are approximately equal with each other, receiving about 80 cents in federal spending for every dollar paid by residents in taxes.

My findings here are similar to the study that was repeatedly sent to Rep. Greene by many of her scoffing critics. Specifically, Green was instructed to read this Moneygeek article which purportedly "proves" that the red states depend heavily on blue-state largesse to survive. Yet, with both our analysis here, and with the Moneygeek article, we will find that the characterization of red states as an economic drain on the country requires quite a bit of hyperbole.2

After "National Divorce": A Red State vs. Blue State Breakdown

Just how badly would red states fare if they were to break off from the blue states? Well, only a minority of these states would be "in the red" and get back significantly more than they pay in. 15 out of 27 red states are either net-tax-paying states or within a few cents of "breaking even." In other words, with the exception of states like Mississippi and West Virginia and Alabama, most of these states could realistically expect to be self-funding in case of a national break-up. Moreover, viewed as a single bloc, the red states' overall "return" on taxes paid is only $1.02. Were these states to become an independent region of their own, it would hardly be impossible to manage with current tax resources. In fact, if a "Red States of America" wanted to ensure available revenues exceeded current tax liabilities, the bloc could simply exclude the less productive states. If Mississippi and West Virginia don't bring much to the table, there's no immutable law of nature requiring the "Red States of America" to include them.

Some of the current net tax receiver states could also easily change their fortunes by simply splitting off the less productive areas such as southwest Alabama, western Mississippi, and eastern Kentucky. The blue states would surely be happy enough to have those areas as dependencies

How Much GDP Do the Red States Produce?

One other tactic used to portray the red states as a bunch of impoverished welfare queens is to claim that the overwhelming majority of the US's GDP is produced in the blue states. Again, this is a sizable exaggeration. Breaking out the blue and red states as we did above, we find that the blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. Specifically, the blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. In this scenario, a red state bloc would still have a GDP over $8 trillion and would have the world's third largest economy behind China and the "Blue States of America." It would have an economy larger than Germany, Japan, and India.

Looking at GDP per capita, we find the red state bloc would remain on a par with western Europe and Canada. If divided up, the blue states today would come in around $69,000 per capita. The red states would come in at about $55,000. Taken as two groups, this would place the blue states on a par with Denmark (at approximately $68,000), and the red states a little above Finland (at approximately $54,000).

Why Some States Are Net Taxpayers, and Some Aren't

Why do we have these large disparities among states? Federal tax revenues are driven heavily by the number of high-earning and full-time workers in each state. States with large numbers of retirees and elderly will thus produce less tax revenue while receiving more in federal spending. States with large low-income populations (relative to overall size) will receive a proportionally higher amount of federal spending. Thus, it's not surprising that Mississippi, with its large low-income population in the Delta region, is a net recipient of federal spending. Similarly, the population in West Virginia is relatively low-income and elderly. Neither of these states have notably large metropolitan areas to balance out these lower-income households. On the other hand, Florida, Texas, Utah, and Ohio have the productive metropolitan areas necessary to balance out populations of pensioners and the unemployed.

It should also be noted that when I say "metropolitan area" I don't mean "urban core." Activists on the Left often like to promote the idea that the most entrepreneurial, productive, and dynamic sectors of society are necessarily concentrated in urban cores. But the data does not show this. Rather "suburbanization" of both employment and labor is a longstanding trend, meaning that many sectors of the economy in recent decades have been decentralized out of the urban core, and each state's most productive centers are often found in the suburban counties—where political leanings are not at all necessarily "blue." Moreover, many of a state's most productive workers—engineers, medical personnel, entrepreneurs, financial workers, for example—choose to live in suburbs. Thus, the most productive states are often states with large sprawling suburban areas, and not necessarily "big cities" in the twentieth-century sense.

The Red States Would Survive

Rep. Greene's Twitter critics are clearly very enthusiastic about portraying Americans in red states as impoverished unsophisticated welfare queens unable to get by without wealth t***sfers from the blue states. It's a convenient narrative, although an inaccurate one. It is likely in most scenarios, however, that secession would come with short-term economic dislocations and disruptions. Yet, short-term economic troubles have never been an insurmountable obstacle to secession and revolution. The American revolutionaries, after all, voluntarily cut themselves off from trade and took on huge debts to achieve political independence. Short term economic realities also do not dictate long-term prospects. If a Red States of America embraced global trade and a reduced regulatory burden, it could expect to see its economy accelerate in the medium and longer term. Moreover, cultural issues often trump economic ones, and residents may be willing to sacrifice some amount of wealth (measurable in dollars) for the perceived advantages of political self-determination. Were red-state Americans given the option to secede in exchange for per capita GDP levels similar to those of Germany, I suspect that many would take that bargain.

1. I have taken the December 2021 spending totals and multiplied by 12 to get an approximate annual total. This gives us a plausible total of approximately $1.1 trillion across all states.
2. The chief problem with the Moneygeek analysis is that it attempts to partly define red state "dependence" on blue states in terms of federal distributions as a percentage of state revenues. This is a faulty type of analysis because this "dependence" ranking depends just as much on state tax levels as on federal spending, and the ranking thus penalizes states with low taxes. Given that state tax rates are fully within control of the state itself, a low-tax state is not actually "dependent" on federal funds since the state could raise taxes at any time without federal consent.
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont... (show quote)


Great article. Thanks for posting.

Reply
Feb 24, 2023 18:40:26   #
TommyRadd Loc: Midwest USA
 
AuntiE wrote:
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont-depend-gravy-train-blue-states

No, Red State Economies Don't Depend on a "Gravy Train" from Blue States
Ryan McMaken

When Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called (again) for "national divorce" this week, a common retort among her detractors on Twitter was to claim that so-called red states are heavily dependent on so-called blue states to pay for pretty much everything. Reporter Molly Knight claimed, for example, that "Red states get their money for roads and cops and schools from blue states. You cut off that gravy train and you e [sic] got a third world country."

twitt
Others claimed that red states would be "entirely broke" without blue states. America's social democrats have apparently fully gone over to pushing the narrative that the "red states" are poor and backward while the "blue states" are productive and economically sophisticated.

tw
The implication here is that red states would never survive any sort of separation from the blue states because the red states would then miss out on the presumably large amounts of free money.

Unfortunately for these critics, the data doesn't really back them up. While it is certainly true that a handful of red states receive much more in federal spending than their residents pay in federal taxes, this is not at all the situation across most red states. This is especially not the case in states with states with larger metropolitan areas such as Florida and Texas.

The real story is more complicated, and to see the details, we can look at state-by-state comparisons in terms of "return on taxes paid." This is a measure of how much each state receives in federal spending for every dollar extracted in federal taxes. States with a "return" above one dollar are getting back more than their residents paid in federal taxes. Residents in a state with a "return" below a dollar pay more than they receive.

To do this analysis, we start with the tax collections from each state, as reported by the Internal Revenue service. Then, we look at federal spending in each state. There are some smaller categories of spending that are difficult to track, but we can capture the overwhelming majority of federal spending in each state by looking at several key categories:

State revenues from federal intergovernmental t***sfers (2019).
Department of Defense spending by state (2019).
Federal share of Medicaid by state (2021).
Medicare spending by state (2019).
Social security spending (OASDI) by state1 (2021).
Once we add it all up we can see the "return on taxes paid" in graph form below:

return
By this analysis, the federal spending in Minnesota only amounted to 48 cents for every tax dollar extracted from the state. On the other hand, Mississippi received more than three dollars for every tax dollar paid by residents. Contrary to the idea that most red states are like Mississippi, however, we find that most states—both red and blue—are much closer to the middle on this. The states that are within a few cents of receiving a dollar for a dollar—i.e., "breaking even"—include the Dakotas, North Carolina, Nevada, Wisconsin, Missouri, Utah, Maryland, Kansas, and Florida. Meanwhile, California and Texas are approximately equal with each other, receiving about 80 cents in federal spending for every dollar paid by residents in taxes.

My findings here are similar to the study that was repeatedly sent to Rep. Greene by many of her scoffing critics. Specifically, Green was instructed to read this Moneygeek article which purportedly "proves" that the red states depend heavily on blue-state largesse to survive. Yet, with both our analysis here, and with the Moneygeek article, we will find that the characterization of red states as an economic drain on the country requires quite a bit of hyperbole.2

After "National Divorce": A Red State vs. Blue State Breakdown

Just how badly would red states fare if they were to break off from the blue states? Well, only a minority of these states would be "in the red" and get back significantly more than they pay in. 15 out of 27 red states are either net-tax-paying states or within a few cents of "breaking even." In other words, with the exception of states like Mississippi and West Virginia and Alabama, most of these states could realistically expect to be self-funding in case of a national break-up. Moreover, viewed as a single bloc, the red states' overall "return" on taxes paid is only $1.02. Were these states to become an independent region of their own, it would hardly be impossible to manage with current tax resources. In fact, if a "Red States of America" wanted to ensure available revenues exceeded current tax liabilities, the bloc could simply exclude the less productive states. If Mississippi and West Virginia don't bring much to the table, there's no immutable law of nature requiring the "Red States of America" to include them.

Some of the current net tax receiver states could also easily change their fortunes by simply splitting off the less productive areas such as southwest Alabama, western Mississippi, and eastern Kentucky. The blue states would surely be happy enough to have those areas as dependencies

How Much GDP Do the Red States Produce?

One other tactic used to portray the red states as a bunch of impoverished welfare queens is to claim that the overwhelming majority of the US's GDP is produced in the blue states. Again, this is a sizable exaggeration. Breaking out the blue and red states as we did above, we find that the blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. Specifically, the blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. In this scenario, a red state bloc would still have a GDP over $8 trillion and would have the world's third largest economy behind China and the "Blue States of America." It would have an economy larger than Germany, Japan, and India.

Looking at GDP per capita, we find the red state bloc would remain on a par with western Europe and Canada. If divided up, the blue states today would come in around $69,000 per capita. The red states would come in at about $55,000. Taken as two groups, this would place the blue states on a par with Denmark (at approximately $68,000), and the red states a little above Finland (at approximately $54,000).

Why Some States Are Net Taxpayers, and Some Aren't

Why do we have these large disparities among states? Federal tax revenues are driven heavily by the number of high-earning and full-time workers in each state. States with large numbers of retirees and elderly will thus produce less tax revenue while receiving more in federal spending. States with large low-income populations (relative to overall size) will receive a proportionally higher amount of federal spending. Thus, it's not surprising that Mississippi, with its large low-income population in the Delta region, is a net recipient of federal spending. Similarly, the population in West Virginia is relatively low-income and elderly. Neither of these states have notably large metropolitan areas to balance out these lower-income households. On the other hand, Florida, Texas, Utah, and Ohio have the productive metropolitan areas necessary to balance out populations of pensioners and the unemployed.

It should also be noted that when I say "metropolitan area" I don't mean "urban core." Activists on the Left often like to promote the idea that the most entrepreneurial, productive, and dynamic sectors of society are necessarily concentrated in urban cores. But the data does not show this. Rather "suburbanization" of both employment and labor is a longstanding trend, meaning that many sectors of the economy in recent decades have been decentralized out of the urban core, and each state's most productive centers are often found in the suburban counties—where political leanings are not at all necessarily "blue." Moreover, many of a state's most productive workers—engineers, medical personnel, entrepreneurs, financial workers, for example—choose to live in suburbs. Thus, the most productive states are often states with large sprawling suburban areas, and not necessarily "big cities" in the twentieth-century sense.

The Red States Would Survive

Rep. Greene's Twitter critics are clearly very enthusiastic about portraying Americans in red states as impoverished unsophisticated welfare queens unable to get by without wealth t***sfers from the blue states. It's a convenient narrative, although an inaccurate one. It is likely in most scenarios, however, that secession would come with short-term economic dislocations and disruptions. Yet, short-term economic troubles have never been an insurmountable obstacle to secession and revolution. The American revolutionaries, after all, voluntarily cut themselves off from trade and took on huge debts to achieve political independence. Short term economic realities also do not dictate long-term prospects. If a Red States of America embraced global trade and a reduced regulatory burden, it could expect to see its economy accelerate in the medium and longer term. Moreover, cultural issues often trump economic ones, and residents may be willing to sacrifice some amount of wealth (measurable in dollars) for the perceived advantages of political self-determination. Were red-state Americans given the option to secede in exchange for per capita GDP levels similar to those of Germany, I suspect that many would take that bargain.

1. I have taken the December 2021 spending totals and multiplied by 12 to get an approximate annual total. This gives us a plausible total of approximately $1.1 trillion across all states.
2. The chief problem with the Moneygeek analysis is that it attempts to partly define red state "dependence" on blue states in terms of federal distributions as a percentage of state revenues. This is a faulty type of analysis because this "dependence" ranking depends just as much on state tax levels as on federal spending, and the ranking thus penalizes states with low taxes. Given that state tax rates are fully within control of the state itself, a low-tax state is not actually "dependent" on federal funds since the state could raise taxes at any time without federal consent.
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont... (show quote)


You know, this really raises a lot of questions…about attitudes.

Why would the progressives be resistant of a splitting of the sheets, if they really thought they would be getting the better end of the deal economically? It doesn’t add up, that is, it doesn’t make sense.

On one hand, they are really big on “immigration” coming into this country (illegal or otherwise), and yet they claim this country is so flawed (and never was “great” to begin with) and that’s why, according to them, it needs to be “fundamentally t***sformed” to embrace their “progressive” views on socialism and entitlements and gobs of bureaucratic regulations and what-not. And what is supposedly standing in their way of reaching their utopian dream for America? Why, it’s “evil, backwards minded, conservatives” who are resistant to their policies, that’s who.

So, they’re claiming now, what? That the only reason they don’t go along with “the big divorce” (which would give them free rein to run amuck with their ideologies) is to save us poor conservatives who wouldn’t survive without them, their handouts, and their programs?

Talk about “nanny-state” mentality! They want to both be Nannie’s and be nannied at the same time!

Or is it a martyrdom-syndrome, or they’re just masochistic and sadistic at the same time? So, that’s why they’re sticking out suffering with us for “our” sakes? And look how magnanimous they are for suffering for us while they impose their ideologies on us!

And yet, they believe they are the “democratic” ones and not the tyrants or f*****ts, when in fact they won’t leave us alone to live our ideology, they just rather insist on attempting to impose theirs on us until we learn to like it?

And we try to reason with these people? Oh, puh-lease!

The only truly ethical thing to do at this point really is to amicably divide up the “estate” like would be expected in a marriage whose partners had irreconcilable differences.

Yes, it has come to that. Reconciliation is not on the table or the horizon. You know it, we know it. And you ain’t gonna change our minds any more than we’re going to change yours. So now what? It’s either separate amicably, mutually assured continuous antagonism (which is our current situation, which only benefits politicians, which is why they opt for this choice), coercion, or war. It appears to me that the last three options are the only ones that l*****ts will consider.

And that smells like “tyranny” to me.

Reply
 
 
Feb 24, 2023 18:47:59   #
American Vet
 
TommyRadd wrote:
You know, this really raises a lot of questions…about attitudes.

Why would the progressives be resistant of a splitting of the sheets, if they really thought they would be getting the better end of the deal economically? It doesn’t add up, that is, it doesn’t make sense.

On one hand, they are really big on “immigration” coming into this country (illegal or otherwise), and yet they claim this country is so flawed (and never was “great” to begin with) and that’s why, according to them, it needs to be “fundamentally t***sformed” to embrace their “progressive” views on socialism and entitlements and gobs of bureaucratic regulations and what-not. And what is supposedly standing in their way of reaching their utopian dream for America? Why, it’s “evil, backwards minded, conservatives” who are resistant to their policies, that’s who.

So, they’re claiming now, what? That the only reason they don’t go along with “the big divorce” (which would give them free rein to run amuck with their ideologies) is to save us poor conservatives who wouldn’t survive without them, their handouts, and their programs?

Talk about “nanny-state” mentality! They want to both be Nannie’s and be nannied at the same time!

Or is it a martyrdom-syndrome, or they’re just masochistic and sadistic at the same time? So, that’s why they’re sticking out suffering with us for “our” sakes? And look how magnanimous they are for suffering for us while they impose their ideologies on us!

And yet, they believe they are the “democratic” ones and not the tyrants or f*****ts, when in fact they won’t leave us alone to live our ideology, they just rather insist on attempting to impose theirs on us until we learn to like it?

And we try to reason with these people? Oh, puh-lease!

The only truly ethical thing to do at this point really is to amicably divide up the “estate” like would be expected in a marriage whose partners had irreconcilable differences.

Yes, it has come to that. Reconciliation is not on the table or the horizon. You know it, we know it. And you ain’t gonna change our minds any more than we’re going to change yours. So now what? It’s either separate amicably, mutually assured continuous antagonism (which is our current situation, which only benefits politicians, which is why they opt for this choice), coercion, or war. It appears to me that the last three options are the only ones that l*****ts will consider.

And that smells like “tyranny” to me.
You know, this really raises a lot of questions…ab... (show quote)


Good comments!

Reply
Feb 24, 2023 19:17:08   #
AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State
 
TommyRadd wrote:
You know, this really raises a lot of questions…about attitudes.

Why would the progressives be resistant of a splitting of the sheets, if they really thought they would be getting the better end of the deal economically? It doesn’t add up, that is, it doesn’t make sense.

On one hand, they are really big on “immigration” coming into this country (illegal or otherwise), and yet they claim this country is so flawed (and never was “great” to begin with) and that’s why, according to them, it needs to be “fundamentally t***sformed” to embrace their “progressive” views on socialism and entitlements and gobs of bureaucratic regulations and what-not. And what is supposedly standing in their way of reaching their utopian dream for America? Why, it’s “evil, backwards minded, conservatives” who are resistant to their policies, that’s who.

So, they’re claiming now, what? That the only reason they don’t go along with “the big divorce” (which would give them free rein to run amuck with their ideologies) is to save us poor conservatives who wouldn’t survive without them, their handouts, and their programs?

Talk about “nanny-state” mentality! They want to both be Nannie’s and be nannied at the same time!

Or is it a martyrdom-syndrome, or they’re just masochistic and sadistic at the same time? So, that’s why they’re sticking out suffering with us for “our” sakes? And look how magnanimous they are for suffering for us while they impose their ideologies on us!

And yet, they believe they are the “democratic” ones and not the tyrants or f*****ts, when in fact they won’t leave us alone to live our ideology, they just rather insist on attempting to impose theirs on us until we learn to like it?

And we try to reason with these people? Oh, puh-lease!

The only truly ethical thing to do at this point really is to amicably divide up the “estate” like would be expected in a marriage whose partners had irreconcilable differences.

Yes, it has come to that. Reconciliation is not on the table or the horizon. You know it, we know it. And you ain’t gonna change our minds any more than we’re going to change yours. So now what? It’s either separate amicably, mutually assured continuous antagonism (which is our current situation, which only benefits politicians, which is why they opt for this choice), coercion, or war. It appears to me that the last three options are the only ones that l*****ts will consider.

And that smells like “tyranny” to me.
You know, this really raises a lot of questions…ab... (show quote)



Reply
Feb 25, 2023 06:06:22   #
Smedley_buzkill
 
AuntiE wrote:
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont-depend-gravy-train-blue-states

No, Red State Economies Don't Depend on a "Gravy Train" from Blue States
Ryan McMaken

When Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called (again) for "national divorce" this week, a common retort among her detractors on Twitter was to claim that so-called red states are heavily dependent on so-called blue states to pay for pretty much everything. Reporter Molly Knight claimed, for example, that "Red states get their money for roads and cops and schools from blue states. You cut off that gravy train and you e [sic] got a third world country."

twitt
Others claimed that red states would be "entirely broke" without blue states. America's social democrats have apparently fully gone over to pushing the narrative that the "red states" are poor and backward while the "blue states" are productive and economically sophisticated.

tw
The implication here is that red states would never survive any sort of separation from the blue states because the red states would then miss out on the presumably large amounts of free money.

Unfortunately for these critics, the data doesn't really back them up. While it is certainly true that a handful of red states receive much more in federal spending than their residents pay in federal taxes, this is not at all the situation across most red states. This is especially not the case in states with states with larger metropolitan areas such as Florida and Texas.

The real story is more complicated, and to see the details, we can look at state-by-state comparisons in terms of "return on taxes paid." This is a measure of how much each state receives in federal spending for every dollar extracted in federal taxes. States with a "return" above one dollar are getting back more than their residents paid in federal taxes. Residents in a state with a "return" below a dollar pay more than they receive.

To do this analysis, we start with the tax collections from each state, as reported by the Internal Revenue service. Then, we look at federal spending in each state. There are some smaller categories of spending that are difficult to track, but we can capture the overwhelming majority of federal spending in each state by looking at several key categories:

State revenues from federal intergovernmental t***sfers (2019).
Department of Defense spending by state (2019).
Federal share of Medicaid by state (2021).
Medicare spending by state (2019).
Social security spending (OASDI) by state1 (2021).
Once we add it all up we can see the "return on taxes paid" in graph form below:

return
By this analysis, the federal spending in Minnesota only amounted to 48 cents for every tax dollar extracted from the state. On the other hand, Mississippi received more than three dollars for every tax dollar paid by residents. Contrary to the idea that most red states are like Mississippi, however, we find that most states—both red and blue—are much closer to the middle on this. The states that are within a few cents of receiving a dollar for a dollar—i.e., "breaking even"—include the Dakotas, North Carolina, Nevada, Wisconsin, Missouri, Utah, Maryland, Kansas, and Florida. Meanwhile, California and Texas are approximately equal with each other, receiving about 80 cents in federal spending for every dollar paid by residents in taxes.

My findings here are similar to the study that was repeatedly sent to Rep. Greene by many of her scoffing critics. Specifically, Green was instructed to read this Moneygeek article which purportedly "proves" that the red states depend heavily on blue-state largesse to survive. Yet, with both our analysis here, and with the Moneygeek article, we will find that the characterization of red states as an economic drain on the country requires quite a bit of hyperbole.2

After "National Divorce": A Red State vs. Blue State Breakdown

Just how badly would red states fare if they were to break off from the blue states? Well, only a minority of these states would be "in the red" and get back significantly more than they pay in. 15 out of 27 red states are either net-tax-paying states or within a few cents of "breaking even." In other words, with the exception of states like Mississippi and West Virginia and Alabama, most of these states could realistically expect to be self-funding in case of a national break-up. Moreover, viewed as a single bloc, the red states' overall "return" on taxes paid is only $1.02. Were these states to become an independent region of their own, it would hardly be impossible to manage with current tax resources. In fact, if a "Red States of America" wanted to ensure available revenues exceeded current tax liabilities, the bloc could simply exclude the less productive states. If Mississippi and West Virginia don't bring much to the table, there's no immutable law of nature requiring the "Red States of America" to include them.

Some of the current net tax receiver states could also easily change their fortunes by simply splitting off the less productive areas such as southwest Alabama, western Mississippi, and eastern Kentucky. The blue states would surely be happy enough to have those areas as dependencies

How Much GDP Do the Red States Produce?

One other tactic used to portray the red states as a bunch of impoverished welfare queens is to claim that the overwhelming majority of the US's GDP is produced in the blue states. Again, this is a sizable exaggeration. Breaking out the blue and red states as we did above, we find that the blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. Specifically, the blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. In this scenario, a red state bloc would still have a GDP over $8 trillion and would have the world's third largest economy behind China and the "Blue States of America." It would have an economy larger than Germany, Japan, and India.

Looking at GDP per capita, we find the red state bloc would remain on a par with western Europe and Canada. If divided up, the blue states today would come in around $69,000 per capita. The red states would come in at about $55,000. Taken as two groups, this would place the blue states on a par with Denmark (at approximately $68,000), and the red states a little above Finland (at approximately $54,000).

Why Some States Are Net Taxpayers, and Some Aren't

Why do we have these large disparities among states? Federal tax revenues are driven heavily by the number of high-earning and full-time workers in each state. States with large numbers of retirees and elderly will thus produce less tax revenue while receiving more in federal spending. States with large low-income populations (relative to overall size) will receive a proportionally higher amount of federal spending. Thus, it's not surprising that Mississippi, with its large low-income population in the Delta region, is a net recipient of federal spending. Similarly, the population in West Virginia is relatively low-income and elderly. Neither of these states have notably large metropolitan areas to balance out these lower-income households. On the other hand, Florida, Texas, Utah, and Ohio have the productive metropolitan areas necessary to balance out populations of pensioners and the unemployed.

It should also be noted that when I say "metropolitan area" I don't mean "urban core." Activists on the Left often like to promote the idea that the most entrepreneurial, productive, and dynamic sectors of society are necessarily concentrated in urban cores. But the data does not show this. Rather "suburbanization" of both employment and labor is a longstanding trend, meaning that many sectors of the economy in recent decades have been decentralized out of the urban core, and each state's most productive centers are often found in the suburban counties—where political leanings are not at all necessarily "blue." Moreover, many of a state's most productive workers—engineers, medical personnel, entrepreneurs, financial workers, for example—choose to live in suburbs. Thus, the most productive states are often states with large sprawling suburban areas, and not necessarily "big cities" in the twentieth-century sense.

The Red States Would Survive

Rep. Greene's Twitter critics are clearly very enthusiastic about portraying Americans in red states as impoverished unsophisticated welfare queens unable to get by without wealth t***sfers from the blue states. It's a convenient narrative, although an inaccurate one. It is likely in most scenarios, however, that secession would come with short-term economic dislocations and disruptions. Yet, short-term economic troubles have never been an insurmountable obstacle to secession and revolution. The American revolutionaries, after all, voluntarily cut themselves off from trade and took on huge debts to achieve political independence. Short term economic realities also do not dictate long-term prospects. If a Red States of America embraced global trade and a reduced regulatory burden, it could expect to see its economy accelerate in the medium and longer term. Moreover, cultural issues often trump economic ones, and residents may be willing to sacrifice some amount of wealth (measurable in dollars) for the perceived advantages of political self-determination. Were red-state Americans given the option to secede in exchange for per capita GDP levels similar to those of Germany, I suspect that many would take that bargain.

1. I have taken the December 2021 spending totals and multiplied by 12 to get an approximate annual total. This gives us a plausible total of approximately $1.1 trillion across all states.
2. The chief problem with the Moneygeek analysis is that it attempts to partly define red state "dependence" on blue states in terms of federal distributions as a percentage of state revenues. This is a faulty type of analysis because this "dependence" ranking depends just as much on state tax levels as on federal spending, and the ranking thus penalizes states with low taxes. Given that state tax rates are fully within control of the state itself, a low-tax state is not actually "dependent" on federal funds since the state could raise taxes at any time without federal consent.
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont... (show quote)


Good post. Timely, if I do say so.

Reply
Feb 25, 2023 10:44:13   #
straightUp Loc: California
 
AuntiE wrote:
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont-depend-gravy-train-blue-states

No, Red State Economies Don't Depend on a "Gravy Train" from Blue States
Ryan McMaken

When Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene called (again) for "national divorce" this week, a common retort among her detractors on Twitter was to claim that so-called red states are heavily dependent on so-called blue states to pay for pretty much everything. Reporter Molly Knight claimed, for example, that "Red states get their money for roads and cops and schools from blue states. You cut off that gravy train and you e [sic] got a third world country."

twitt
Others claimed that red states would be "entirely broke" without blue states. America's social democrats have apparently fully gone over to pushing the narrative that the "red states" are poor and backward while the "blue states" are productive and economically sophisticated.

tw
The implication here is that red states would never survive any sort of separation from the blue states because the red states would then miss out on the presumably large amounts of free money.

Unfortunately for these critics, the data doesn't really back them up. While it is certainly true that a handful of red states receive much more in federal spending than their residents pay in federal taxes, this is not at all the situation across most red states. This is especially not the case in states with states with larger metropolitan areas such as Florida and Texas.

The real story is more complicated, and to see the details, we can look at state-by-state comparisons in terms of "return on taxes paid." This is a measure of how much each state receives in federal spending for every dollar extracted in federal taxes. States with a "return" above one dollar are getting back more than their residents paid in federal taxes. Residents in a state with a "return" below a dollar pay more than they receive.

To do this analysis, we start with the tax collections from each state, as reported by the Internal Revenue service. Then, we look at federal spending in each state. There are some smaller categories of spending that are difficult to track, but we can capture the overwhelming majority of federal spending in each state by looking at several key categories:

State revenues from federal intergovernmental t***sfers (2019).
Department of Defense spending by state (2019).
Federal share of Medicaid by state (2021).
Medicare spending by state (2019).
Social security spending (OASDI) by state1 (2021).
Once we add it all up we can see the "return on taxes paid" in graph form below:

return
By this analysis, the federal spending in Minnesota only amounted to 48 cents for every tax dollar extracted from the state. On the other hand, Mississippi received more than three dollars for every tax dollar paid by residents. Contrary to the idea that most red states are like Mississippi, however, we find that most states—both red and blue—are much closer to the middle on this. The states that are within a few cents of receiving a dollar for a dollar—i.e., "breaking even"—include the Dakotas, North Carolina, Nevada, Wisconsin, Missouri, Utah, Maryland, Kansas, and Florida. Meanwhile, California and Texas are approximately equal with each other, receiving about 80 cents in federal spending for every dollar paid by residents in taxes.

My findings here are similar to the study that was repeatedly sent to Rep. Greene by many of her scoffing critics. Specifically, Green was instructed to read this Moneygeek article which purportedly "proves" that the red states depend heavily on blue-state largesse to survive. Yet, with both our analysis here, and with the Moneygeek article, we will find that the characterization of red states as an economic drain on the country requires quite a bit of hyperbole.2

After "National Divorce": A Red State vs. Blue State Breakdown

Just how badly would red states fare if they were to break off from the blue states? Well, only a minority of these states would be "in the red" and get back significantly more than they pay in. 15 out of 27 red states are either net-tax-paying states or within a few cents of "breaking even." In other words, with the exception of states like Mississippi and West Virginia and Alabama, most of these states could realistically expect to be self-funding in case of a national break-up. Moreover, viewed as a single bloc, the red states' overall "return" on taxes paid is only $1.02. Were these states to become an independent region of their own, it would hardly be impossible to manage with current tax resources. In fact, if a "Red States of America" wanted to ensure available revenues exceeded current tax liabilities, the bloc could simply exclude the less productive states. If Mississippi and West Virginia don't bring much to the table, there's no immutable law of nature requiring the "Red States of America" to include them.

Some of the current net tax receiver states could also easily change their fortunes by simply splitting off the less productive areas such as southwest Alabama, western Mississippi, and eastern Kentucky. The blue states would surely be happy enough to have those areas as dependencies

How Much GDP Do the Red States Produce?

One other tactic used to portray the red states as a bunch of impoverished welfare queens is to claim that the overwhelming majority of the US's GDP is produced in the blue states. Again, this is a sizable exaggeration. Breaking out the blue and red states as we did above, we find that the blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. Specifically, the blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. In this scenario, a red state bloc would still have a GDP over $8 trillion and would have the world's third largest economy behind China and the "Blue States of America." It would have an economy larger than Germany, Japan, and India.

Looking at GDP per capita, we find the red state bloc would remain on a par with western Europe and Canada. If divided up, the blue states today would come in around $69,000 per capita. The red states would come in at about $55,000. Taken as two groups, this would place the blue states on a par with Denmark (at approximately $68,000), and the red states a little above Finland (at approximately $54,000).

Why Some States Are Net Taxpayers, and Some Aren't

Why do we have these large disparities among states? Federal tax revenues are driven heavily by the number of high-earning and full-time workers in each state. States with large numbers of retirees and elderly will thus produce less tax revenue while receiving more in federal spending. States with large low-income populations (relative to overall size) will receive a proportionally higher amount of federal spending. Thus, it's not surprising that Mississippi, with its large low-income population in the Delta region, is a net recipient of federal spending. Similarly, the population in West Virginia is relatively low-income and elderly. Neither of these states have notably large metropolitan areas to balance out these lower-income households. On the other hand, Florida, Texas, Utah, and Ohio have the productive metropolitan areas necessary to balance out populations of pensioners and the unemployed.

It should also be noted that when I say "metropolitan area" I don't mean "urban core." Activists on the Left often like to promote the idea that the most entrepreneurial, productive, and dynamic sectors of society are necessarily concentrated in urban cores. But the data does not show this. Rather "suburbanization" of both employment and labor is a longstanding trend, meaning that many sectors of the economy in recent decades have been decentralized out of the urban core, and each state's most productive centers are often found in the suburban counties—where political leanings are not at all necessarily "blue." Moreover, many of a state's most productive workers—engineers, medical personnel, entrepreneurs, financial workers, for example—choose to live in suburbs. Thus, the most productive states are often states with large sprawling suburban areas, and not necessarily "big cities" in the twentieth-century sense.

The Red States Would Survive

Rep. Greene's Twitter critics are clearly very enthusiastic about portraying Americans in red states as impoverished unsophisticated welfare queens unable to get by without wealth t***sfers from the blue states. It's a convenient narrative, although an inaccurate one. It is likely in most scenarios, however, that secession would come with short-term economic dislocations and disruptions. Yet, short-term economic troubles have never been an insurmountable obstacle to secession and revolution. The American revolutionaries, after all, voluntarily cut themselves off from trade and took on huge debts to achieve political independence. Short term economic realities also do not dictate long-term prospects. If a Red States of America embraced global trade and a reduced regulatory burden, it could expect to see its economy accelerate in the medium and longer term. Moreover, cultural issues often trump economic ones, and residents may be willing to sacrifice some amount of wealth (measurable in dollars) for the perceived advantages of political self-determination. Were red-state Americans given the option to secede in exchange for per capita GDP levels similar to those of Germany, I suspect that many would take that bargain.

1. I have taken the December 2021 spending totals and multiplied by 12 to get an approximate annual total. This gives us a plausible total of approximately $1.1 trillion across all states.
2. The chief problem with the Moneygeek analysis is that it attempts to partly define red state "dependence" on blue states in terms of federal distributions as a percentage of state revenues. This is a faulty type of analysis because this "dependence" ranking depends just as much on state tax levels as on federal spending, and the ranking thus penalizes states with low taxes. Given that state tax rates are fully within control of the state itself, a low-tax state is not actually "dependent" on federal funds since the state could raise taxes at any time without federal consent.
https://mises.org/wire/no-red-state-economies-dont... (show quote)


Auntie - thank you for presenting Ryan McMaken's analysis. His thoughtful approach to the issue was far more intelligent than the knee-jerk responses I was getting from my post on MTG's proposal. https://www.onepoliticalplaza.com/tpr?p=4430341&t=271604

But he doesn't actually dispute either the of the claims I made in that OP. My first claim was that 14 of the 28 red states take more from federal reserves than they give. McMaken's charts actually worsen the picture by indicating that 19 of the 28 red states take more from federal resources than they give. Of course he worsens the picture for the blue states too, by indicating that 9 of the 22 blue states do the same.

One of the sources of discrepancy is that he is only counting the money collected by the states and not the money collected by residents of those states as individual benefactors, such as Medicare patients. Either way, the net effect is the same... Half the red states (or the majority of them according to McMaken) take more from federal reserves than they give and yes... that DOES makes them dependent. So you essentially debunked your own claim.

I'm not saying that red states will roll over and die if we close the spigot, I'm sure they would adjust one way or another, but that was never my point. My point is that if the red states want a divorce as MTG is suggesting then it would mean the blue states wouldn't have to fund them anymore.

The other thing to point out is his explanation for why *some* red states actually do better. Twice in his article he says that states like Texas and Florida do better because they have large metropolitan areas. To that I would add that those metropolitan areas tend to be blue, even in red states. Here's a a look at Texas during the 2022 e******ns.



Those blue bubbles are basically all the major cites where most of the GDP is produced. Dallas/Ft Worth, Houston, San Antonio, etc..

One thing that McMaken stated that does make sense is that blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. But then he goes on to claim that "blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. But the fact is most of the GDP produced in the wealthier red states actually come from their own blue regions.

MTG isn't the smartest cookie in Congress, she doesn't seem to understand that the partisan divide between blue and red doesn't run along state lines. In fact when you look closer it's easy to the division is more between urban regions and rural regions. 83% of the American people live in urban regions including those blue regions in the red states and yes, that 's were 90% of the GDP comes from and yes, they are overwhelmingly blue.

This actually takes me to the second point that I made in my OP... the fact that the moderate-to-liberal "blue people" that make up the majority of the American population and generate almost all the GDP are getting pretty tired of being dictated to by the hard-right "red people" that only make up a minority of the population by virtue of the disproportionate representation in Congress. But that point was forgotten in all the fussing over blue state vs red state BS.

Like I said... If "hard-right" people like MTG want a divorce, by all means do it. Let's see what McMaken numbers look like when the those blue bubbles in Texas refuse to go along with the plan.

Reply
 
 
Feb 25, 2023 11:29:38   #
TommyRadd Loc: Midwest USA
 
straightUp wrote:
Auntie - thank you for presenting Ryan McMaken's analysis. His thoughtful approach to the issue was far more intelligent than the knee-jerk responses I was getting from my post on MTG's proposal. https://www.onepoliticalplaza.com/tpr?p=4430341&t=271604

But he doesn't actually dispute either the of the claims I made in that OP. My first claim was that 14 of the 28 red states take more from federal reserves than they give. McMaken's charts actually worsen the picture by indicating that 19 of the 28 red states take more from federal resources than they give. Of course he worsens the picture for the blue states too, by indicating that 9 of the 22 blue states do the same.

One of the sources of discrepancy is that he is only counting the money collected by the states and not the money collected by residents of those states as individual benefactors, such as Medicare patients. Either way, the net effect is the same... Half the red states (or the majority of them according to McMaken) take more from federal reserves than they give and yes... that DOES makes them dependent. So you essentially debunked your own claim.

I'm not saying that red states will roll over and die if we close the spigot, I'm sure they would adjust one way or another, but that was never my point. My point is that if the red states want a divorce as MTG is suggesting then it would mean the blue states wouldn't have to fund them anymore.

The other thing to point out is his explanation for why *some* red states actually do better. Twice in his article he says that states like Texas and Florida do better because they have large metropolitan areas. To that I would add that those metropolitan areas tend to be blue, even in red states. Here's a a look at Texas during the 2022 e******ns.



Those blue bubbles are basically all the major cites where most of the GDP is produced. Dallas/Ft Worth, Houston, San Antonio, etc..

One thing that McMaken stated that does make sense is that blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. But then he goes on to claim that "blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. But the fact is most of the GDP produced in the wealthier red states actually come from their own blue regions.

MTG isn't the smartest cookie in Congress, she doesn't seem to understand that the partisan divide between blue and red doesn't run along state lines. In fact when you look closer it's easy to the division is more between urban regions and rural regions. 83% of the American people live in urban regions including those blue regions in the red states and yes, that 's were 90% of the GDP comes from and yes, they are overwhelmingly blue.

This actually takes me to the second point that I made in my OP... the fact that the moderate-to-liberal "blue people" that make up the majority of the American population and generate almost all the GDP are getting pretty tired of being dictated to by the hard-right "red people" that only make up a minority of the population by virtue of the disproportionate representation in Congress. But that point was forgotten in all the fussing over blue state vs red state BS.

Like I said... If "hard-right" people like MTG want a divorce, by all means do it. Let's see what McMaken numbers look like when the those blue bubbles in Texas refuse to go along with the plan.
Auntie - thank you for presenting Ryan McMaken's a... (show quote)


Another factor you aren’t considering is how much l*****t policies have been imposed on all of us which means nothing is “pure”. Neither the left nor the right has a monopoly on anything, anyone, or any place in this country. And the reason any of the populated areas are predominantly blue is (arguably) because of massive propaganda campaigns from marxists both in media and education. And secondly the overall apathy of Americans to learn and understand what the principles were that produced this great country, which certainly are NOT being fairly taught in our education systems. Therefore, to dictate policy by such exercises in data like this would be in themselves a type of an exercise in “tyranny by the masses” which is repugnant to the American principles upon which the constitution was founded.


The discussion on whether or not to separate isn’t a geographical issue, but a moral one. Is anyone actually saying that? Or are they simply proposing that as part of the solution or outcome of the “divorce”?

There are those of us who will never go along with the idea that an unborn human being is merely a lump of tissue, and thereby a “choice” of convenience to be made.

There are those of us who will never go along with the notion that male and female are “a choice” and are not determined primarily by their c********es and secondarily by their g*****lia (considering only the rare cases of hermaphrodites, for example, as exceptions, and not “choice” particularly in regard to children).

There are some of us who will never go along with allowing “d**g q***n hours” and the like in schools or any other place where children are present.

Do positions like this make me “extreme right”?

Are these positions compatible with l*****ts who constantly put forth laws, rules, and other social impositions, to force me to comply with such idiocy?

Which raises the question, what is “extreme right”? And who determines it? You?

Reply
Feb 25, 2023 12:06:41   #
straightUp Loc: California
 
TommyRadd wrote:
You know, this really raises a lot of questions…about attitudes.

Why would the progressives be resistant of a splitting of the sheets, if they really thought they would be getting the better end of the deal economically? It doesn’t add up, that is, it doesn’t make sense.

My point exactly, which is why I am telling hard-right politicians like MTG to go for it.

TommyRadd wrote:

On one hand, they are really big on “immigration” coming into this country (illegal or otherwise), and yet they claim this country is so flawed (and never was “great” to begin with) and that’s why, according to them, it needs to be “fundamentally t***sformed” to embrace their “progressive” views on socialism and entitlements and gobs of bureaucratic regulations and what-not.

Gotta stop you here for a second. Progressives are NOT supporting i*****l i*********n. That's basically a popular fabrication created by the right to demonize the process of allowing immigrants in at all. And I'm sorry if your offended by people who don't go along with the chauvinism of claiming how much better America is than everyone else, or that you think it's an insult to America to suggest there is something about it that can be improved or that you think helping people in need is Marxism or that you fail to understand how much people in red states depend on those entitlements, such as the massive subsidies for farmers or how bureaucratic regulations are the reason why children aren't working in coal mines anymore and why we can drink our water without getting sick. But why don't you just stick with the facts, instead of being consumed by "attitudes"?

I don't want to hijack this thread so, if you want to argue about any of these issues, feel free to PM me or start another thread. My only point here is that you're creating a strawman argument.

TommyRadd wrote:

And what is supposedly standing in their way of reaching their utopian dream for America? Why, it’s “evil, backwards minded, conservatives” who are resistant to their policies, that’s who.

Well, a sought after "utopia" is as much an exaggeration as an "open border" is and I wouldn't call conservatives "evil" necessarily, but yes... backward... I would agree with that.

TommyRadd wrote:

So, they’re claiming now, what? That the only reason they don’t go along with “the big divorce” (which would give them free rein to run amuck with their ideologies) is to save us poor conservatives who wouldn’t survive without them, their handouts, and their programs?

I haven't actually heard that claim, but feel free to make it up, it's what you people do. I'll say one thing here... If the red states want a divorce I am ALL FOR IT. I would LOVE to loose the liability of half-wits that don't have the intelligence to see things for what they are.

TommyRadd wrote:

Talk about “nanny-state” mentality! They want to both be Nannie’s and be nannied at the same time! Or is it a martyrdom-syndrome, or they’re just masochistic and sadistic at the same time?

What the matter? 'Can't make up your mind which lie to go with?

TommyRadd wrote:

So, that’s why they’re sticking out suffering with us for “our” sakes? And look how magnanimous they are for suffering for us while they impose their ideologies on us!

Look, if you don't like our ideologies then get that divorce. With right-wing pundits like Ann Coulter slamming MTG for suggesting it, I'm not getting the impression that progressives are the one's freaking out about it.

TommyRadd wrote:

And yet, they believe they are the “democratic” ones and not the tyrants or f*****ts, when in fact they won’t leave us alone to live our ideology, they just rather insist on attempting to impose theirs on us until we learn to like it?

Are you forgetting the right-wing attacks on education, women's rights and the L**T community? Are you forgetting that anytime a community v**es to ban assault weapons for the sake of their children, right-wing assholes try everything in the book to overrule them? Did you forget it was the right that violently attacked our Capitol to stop the e******n, oh "democratic" one?

Are you going to try and justify all these assaults now as if progressives can't do the same thing for their own ideological fronts?

TommyRadd wrote:

And we try to reason with these people? Oh, puh-lease!

I don't see you reasoning with anyone. I don't see ANYONE on the right trying to reason with anyone. What I see is you doing here is coming with excuses NOT to reason with us.

TommyRadd wrote:

The only truly ethical thing to do at this point really is to amicably divide up the “estate” like would be expected in a marriage whose partners had irreconcilable differences.

Again, I'm all for it. If you think you can make it happen. It's a tall order because the world is complicated but if were possible, I'm sure we progressives would be very much relieved. You live your way and I'll live mine.

TommyRadd wrote:

Yes, it has come to that. Reconciliation is not on the table or the horizon. You know it, we know it. And you ain’t gonna change our minds any more than we’re going to change yours. So now what? It’s either separate amicably, mutually assured continuous antagonism (which is our current situation, which only benefits politicians, which is why they opt for this choice), coercion, or war. It appears to me that the last three options are the only ones that l*****ts will consider.

And that smells like “tyranny” to me.
br Yes, it has come to that. Reconciliation is... (show quote)

Well, I'm your living proof that some liberals are perfectly fine with an amicable separation, and like I said most of the fury that I'm hearing about this divorce is on the right. You folks seem pretty divided on this. I think it's kind of funny how you want to project it all on the left, who are basically rolling their eyes.

Reply
Feb 25, 2023 16:18:12   #
straightUp Loc: California
 
TommyRadd wrote:
Another factor you aren’t considering is how much l*****t policies have been imposed on all of us which means nothing is “pure”. Neither the left nor the right has a monopoly on anything, anyone, or any place in this country.

Not forgetting the fact that right-wing policies have also been imposed on all of us, I would agree.

TommyRadd wrote:

And the reason any of the populated areas are predominantly blue is (arguably) because of massive propaganda campaigns from marxists both in media and education.

There is absolutely no evidence of that.

TommyRadd wrote:

And secondly the overall apathy of Americans to learn and understand what the principles were that produced this great country,

I agree that Americans on the whole tend to be apathetic about things like civics but I have also noticed that the more people learn about these things the less likely they are to gush about how "great" America is.

TommyRadd wrote:

which certainly are NOT being fairly taught in our education systems.

That's because the right continues to defund public education insisting that they should ONLY teach the three R's and nothing else.

TommyRadd wrote:

Therefore, to dictate policy by such exercises in data like this would be in themselves a type of an exercise in “tyranny by the masses” which is repugnant to the American principles upon which the constitution was founded.

If you're trying to tell me that data-driven policy goes against the grain of this countries foundation, you're going to have to explain in more detail. To be honest, I don't think you can. BTW, "tyranny of the masses" *IS* democracy. I don't know how naive you actually are but a policy that pleases everyone is a near impossibility, so there will ALWAYS be those who feel the policy is being imposed on them in a tyrannical manner. The question is whether or not laws are dictated by one person, a few people or the majority of the people. That last option is democracy, as imperfect as it may be. As far as I know, our country was indeed founded on democratic principles.

TommyRadd wrote:

The discussion on whether or not to separate isn’t a geographical issue, but a moral one. Is anyone actually saying that? Or are they simply proposing that as part of the solution or outcome of the “divorce”?

According to MTG, it *IS* a "moral" issue. She's as hung up ideology and culture wars as you appear to be and she's really the only one pushing this idea at the congressional level.

TommyRadd wrote:

There are those of us who will never go along with the idea that an unborn human being is merely a lump of tissue, and thereby a “choice” of convenience to be made.

I don't think anyone believes that. Those who argue for choice have a completely different perspective that you folks throw out of the conversation without the slightest consideration and *replace* it with your own narratives about what pro-choice people think.

TommyRadd wrote:

There are those of us who will never go along with the notion that male and female are “a choice” and are not determined primarily by their c********es and secondarily by their g*****lia (considering only the rare cases of hermaphrodites, for example, as exceptions, and not “choice” particularly in regard to children).

No one is arguing about biology either. The whole "g****r-fluid" issue is about how people feel about themselves, not their c********es or what's h*****g between their legs. Some people just can't handle the idea that anyone would identify or act like a member of the opposite sex. Honestly, I don't see what the big deal is. If a man wants to identify as a woman, fine. If a woman wants to identify as a man, fine. Why would it matter to me or anyone else?

TommyRadd wrote:

There are some of us who will never go along with allowing “d**g q***n hours” and the like in schools or any other place where children are present.

Schools don't have d**g q***n hours, that's just another h********c lie. As for being in public, male entertainers have been dressing as women for centuries. When Shakespeare was writing plays, NONE of his women characters were actually being played by women. It wasn't exactly the end of English society.

TommyRadd wrote:

Do positions like this make me “extreme right”?

I would say yes... The fact that each one of your issues is an attack on people making choices for themselves DOES seem to indicate that you are a freedom-hating right-winger.

TommyRadd wrote:

Are these positions compatible with l*****ts who constantly put forth laws, rules, and other social impositions, to force me to comply with such idiocy?

No one is forcing you to abort your pregnancy.
No one is forcing you to be a member of the opposite sex
No one is forcing you to watch d**g q***ns.

Seriously, the ONLY thing the "l*****ts" are forcing on you in any of these instances is that you can't force your own hangups on others. This whole ridiculous culture war is driven by conservatives dictating to everyone else what THEY think should be allowed.

TommyRadd wrote:

Which raises the question, what is “extreme right”? And who determines it? You?

I don't make that determination on my own, if that's what you're asking. I think the determination is made by consensus. But I can offer by best assessment...

After a LOT of study over many years my assessment is that the right strives to be exclusive while the left strives to be inclusive.

This goes all the way back to when the analogy first started during the French Revolution, when there was a period of time that the king and the republicans tried to share power. In the General Assembly, all the loyalists who supported a monarchy (where the people are excluded from power) sat to the right of the king and all the Republicans that advocated a republic (where the people are included in a democratic power structure) sat on the left. Throughout the rest of history and across the globe, reference to the political left and right, follow the same basic idea.

This explains why the N**is who excluded Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, immigrants and anyone else not though to be part of the master race, are considered right wing. I know the N**is claimed to be socialists and that's the Goldberg excuse for calling the N**is left wing, but it wasn't until the 90's when Goldberg initiated that revision in his book. Up until then, everyone considered the N**is and all forms of f*****m to be right wing, whether they knew why or not. The fact is, in the 1930's ALL populist movements used the promise of socialism to gain popular support. FDR did it and so did Hitler and neither of them actually took it all the way.

In any case, people remember the N**is for their exclusions. My bet is that you know at least something about the exclusion of Jews but nothing about their socialist policies, other than the reference to socialism in their official title... much like how the official title of North Korea is the "Democratic People's Republic of North Korea." Do you think that makes North Korea a democratic country?

One more thing before I stop beating this dead horse... When it comes to socialism, which leans on the government to determine the abilities and needs of the people, it's the government itself that can also determine if socialism is a good idea or a really bad one. Historically, most examples of socialism have depended on democratic governments, which means the people have a voice in this determination. This is called Democratic Socialism and is the basis for ALL advocates of socialism in America today. The N**is, being as exclusive as they were had a different form of socialism in mind, one in which an exclusive (tyrannical) form of government make these determinations without the people. This is called "National Socialism" and self-described democratic socialists like Bernie Sanders and AOC would rather eat their own feet than support national socialism.

As tired as everyone is to hear N**i references, it's a good case for study because the N**i state doesn't exist anymore. It's difficult to be so blunt about current societies without offending people. But immigration is one litmus test for all current societies where the cards are face up on ther table. Go to ANY country in the world and find the people trying to keep the immigrants out and you have found their right wing.

Say something like "black l***s m****r" (not matters more, just matters) and if you see people getting upset by the suggestion you have found the right-wing. When someone like MTG says, Democrats moving to red states should not be allowed to v**e for five years, you have found the right-wing.

The extremity is just a matter of degree and it applies to the left as well as the right... when their affinity takes them beyond what people consider to be reasonable discourse, it's extreme. V****g for a candidate who advocates exclusion for instance is a v**e for the right, but violently attacking the Capitol to interfere with the democratic process is extreme.

I know you're right-wing, you make that abundantly clear, but I don't know enough about you to really know bow extreme you are.

Reply
Feb 25, 2023 16:43:45   #
AuntiE Loc: 45th Least Free State
 
straightUp wrote:
Auntie - thank you for presenting Ryan McMaken's analysis. His thoughtful approach to the issue was far more intelligent than the knee-jerk responses I was getting from my post on MTG's proposal. https://www.onepoliticalplaza.com/tpr?p=4430341&t=271604


Has it occurred to you, yet, people simply do not like you? Rhetorical question.

Your arrogance tends to be off putting.

Quote:
But he doesn't actually dispute either the of the claims I made in that OP. My first claim was that 14 of the 28 red states take more from federal reserves than they give. McMaken's charts actually worsen the picture by indicating that 19 of the 28 red states take more from federal resources than they give. Of course he worsens the picture for the blue states too, by indicating that 9 of the 22 blue states do the same.

One of the sources of discrepancy is that he is only counting the money collected by the states and not the money collected by residents of those states as individual benefactors, such as Medicare patients. Either way, the net effect is the same... Half the red states (or the majority of them according to McMaken) take more from federal reserves than they give and yes... that DOES makes them dependent. So you essentially debunked your own claim.

I'm not saying that red states will roll over and die if we close the spigot, I'm sure they would adjust one way or another, but that was never my point. My point is that if the red states want a divorce as MTG is suggesting then it would mean the blue states wouldn't have to fund them anymore.

The other thing to point out is his explanation for why *some* red states actually do better. Twice in his article he says that states like Texas and Florida do better because they have large metropolitan areas. To that I would add that those metropolitan areas tend to be blue, even in red states. Here's a a look at Texas during the 2022 e******ns.



Those blue bubbles are basically all the major cites where most of the GDP is produced. Dallas/Ft Worth, Houston, San Antonio, etc..

One thing that McMaken stated that does make sense is that blue states naturally produce more GDP because they have more people. But then he goes on to claim that "blue states contain about 54 percent of the US population and they produce about 59 percent of GDP. In contrast, the red states contain about 46 percent of the US population and produce 40 percent of GDP. But the fact is most of the GDP produced in the wealthier red states actually come from their own blue regions.

MTG isn't the smartest cookie in Congress, she doesn't seem to understand that the partisan divide between blue and red doesn't run along state lines. In fact when you look closer it's easy to the division is more between urban regions and rural regions. 83% of the American people live in urban regions including those blue regions in the red states and yes, that 's were 90% of the GDP comes from and yes, they are overwhelmingly blue.

This actually takes me to the second point that I made in my OP... the fact that the moderate-to-liberal "blue people" that make up the majority of the American population and generate almost all the GDP are getting pretty tired of being dictated to by the hard-right "red people" that only make up a minority of the population by virtue of the disproportionate representation in Congress. But that point was forgotten in all the fussing over blue state vs red state BS.

Like I said... If "hard-right" people like MTG want a divorce, by all means do it. Let's see what McMaken numbers look like when the those blue bubbles in Texas refuse to go along with the plan.
But he doesn't actually dispute either the of the ... (show quote)

Reply
 
 
Feb 25, 2023 18:27:17   #
TommyRadd Loc: Midwest USA
 
Hey, “straightup”,

Before we even get into a discussion…

Let’s see if you are able to admit and retract when you are wrong. I’ll just provide one example for now.

You said…

straightUp wrote:
“Schools don't have d**g q***n hours, that's just another h********c lie. As for being in public, male entertainers have been dressing as women for centuries. When Shakespeare was writing plays, NONE of his women characters were actually being played by women. It wasn't exactly the end of English society.”


So let’s ask if d**g q***n hour at schools is or isn’t a thing… you called it a “h********c lie”. Pretty strong words! And, pretty adamant words. But totally wrong!

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/when-exactly-did-d**g-queens-in-schools-become-a-thing/

See the twitter convo here…
https://twitter.com/CraigDMauger/status/1537147134142824448

Another article…
“Over $200K being spent on d**g q***n shows at NYC schools, records show”
“New York is showering taxpayer funds on a group that sends d**g q***ns into city schools — often without parental knowledge or consent — even as parents in other states protest increasingly aggressive efforts to expose kids to g****r-bending performers.
“Last month alone, D**g Story Hour NYC — a nonprofit whose outrageously cross-dressed performers interact with kids as young as 3 — earned $46,000 from city contracts for appearances at public schools, street festivals, and libraries, city records show.
“Since January, the group has organized 49 d**g programs in 34 public elementary, middle, and high schools, it boasted on its website, with appearances in all five boroughs.”
https://nypost.com/2022/06/11/over-200k-being-spent-on-d**g-queen-shows-at-nyc-schools/



“D.C. Public Schools host d**g q***n performance for high school students…
“The D.C. Public Schools is hosting a d**g q***n performance as part of a p***e month celebration for high school students to celebrate during the last month of classes.
“The event comes as public schools in Pennsylvania, Iowa, Colorado, New York, Illinois and other states have increasingly made d**g q***n shows and story hours a featured part of “family-friendly” June p***e month celebrations, sparking outrage among conservatives.
“Chancellor Lewis D. Ferebee announced the “Leading with P***e!” celebration at the Ballou STAY public school campus in an email to DCPS families on Thursday night.”https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/3/dc-public-schools-host-d**g-queen-performance-high/


“D**g Q***ns in the Classroom Teach Inclusion and Fun, Offering a World of Imagination…
“Q***r communities in the United States are under attack. Across the country, legislators are passing bills banning certain g****r affirming care for t***s youth, prohibiting teachers from talking about L***Q+ identity in the classroom, mandating what sports teams t***s kids can and can’t play on, and much more. One of the most recent flashpoints in an ongoing series of assaults on q***r bodies, spaces, and fundamental rights has been kid-oriented p***e events, specifically ones that feature d**g q***ns.
“Once at home only in dimly-lit gay bars after sundown, d**g performers have recently stepped into the spotlight as mainstream media stars, thanks largely to Emmy Award-winning television series RuPaul’s D**g Race, which debuted in 2009. More recently still, they’ve moved into the fluorescent lights of educational spaces, like schools, libraries, and bookstores, through the work of organizations like D**g Q***n Story Hour (DQSH) and Queens of the Castro…”
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/d**g-queens-in-the-classroom

Do you really not understand the difference between male actors dressing as women in plays versus men dressing as women to go to public schools to indoctrinate young innocent yet impressionable minds towards homosexuality?

Honestly, I can’t bring myself to envision any conversation you and I may have going well if you can’t see, accept, and understand the gravity of the perverseness this topic, and the differences between actors and sexual d*****ts being allowed to influence young children for the sole purpose of making their deviance openly socially acceptable. I mean, society should be outraged if it were prostitutes going to “prostitute hour” to teach kids it’s okay to visit whores.

Does that make me “prostitution-phobic”. If not, why would you accuse me of being “h********c”?

This is not about homophobia. This is about, What do things that adults do in their bedrooms have to with what underage children are taught in school?

So, are you ready to admit you were wrong in claiming there are no “d**g q***n hours” in schools?

Reply
Feb 26, 2023 10:55:58   #
straightUp Loc: California
 
Auntie wrote:
Has it occurred to you, yet, people simply do not like you? Rhetorical question.

Well.... right-wing f*****ts don't like me. Do you think I care? (Rhetorical question).

Auntie wrote:

Your arrogance tends to be off putting.

Oh, you mean my ability to pick apart arguments while maintaining a cheery disposition? :) - Yeah, that drives right-wing f*****ts up the wall... ("You arrogant POS!" - LOL) It's one of the things I am frequently complimented on by people who really don't like the views that you seem to subscribe to.

Anything else?

Reply
Feb 26, 2023 13:41:50   #
straightUp Loc: California
 
TommyRadd wrote:
Hey, “straightup”,

Before we even get into a discussion…

Let’s see if you are able to admit and retract when you are wrong. I’ll just provide one example for now.

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/when-exactly-did-d**g-queens-in-schools-become-a-thing/

This two paragraph article spends one paragraph just ranting about how much we hear about d**g q***ns these days and the second one presents a quote from the Attorney General of Michigan at a civil rights conference. Where she said "A d**g q***n for every school" If you click on the tweet (that's apparently their source) you can find a link to another article by the Detroit News that says she was joking. Was she? Hmmm, Oh, look there's an audio clip of that very quote. So I listened to it and yes, she was obviously joking and you can hear the audience laughing.

She was addressing the issue of "f**e problems", which I totally get. The f*****t right is a factory of f**e problems to get people all riled up about the "evil, c*******t, g****r-confused" left. That's what I was referring to in my sinking ship analogy earlier when I said the Democrats try to bargain with their constituents about the life boats, where the Republicans just tell their constituents that the d**g q***n show on the entertainment schedule is a far bigger issue.

In case you didn't know, it's pretty common to joke about the ridiculousness of the moronic culture wars that have the same effect on the right as a laser pointer does on a cat.

In any case, there's a huge difference between d**g q***ns in schools and a joke made by an attorney general who doesn't even work with the schools... How you got one from the other is beyond me. (although I could guess)

TommyRadd wrote:

See the twitter convo here…
https://twitter.com/CraigDMauger/status/1537147134142824448

Yeah, I did... That's how I got to the audio clip.

TommyRadd wrote:

Another article…
“Over $200K being spent on d**g q***n shows at NYC schools, records show”
“New York is showering taxpayer funds on a group that sends d**g q***ns into city schools — often without parental knowledge or consent — even as parents in other states protest increasingly aggressive efforts to expose kids to g****r-bending performers.
“Last month alone, D**g Story Hour NYC — a nonprofit whose outrageously cross-dressed performers interact with kids as young as 3 — earned $46,000 from city contracts for appearances at public schools, street festivals, and libraries, city records show.
“Since January, the group has organized 49 d**g programs in 34 public elementary, middle, and high schools, it boasted on its website, with appearances in all five boroughs.”
https://nypost.com/2022/06/11/over-200k-being-spent-on-d**g-queen-shows-at-nyc-schools/
br Another article… br “Over $200K being spent on... (show quote)

OK.. You might have something here. It's not exactly what I thought you were suggesting though... It's only one city and it's not actually part of the the school curriculum. It's an independent non-profit organization that's experimenting with the idea of introducing diversity to young children as a possible preventative to the h**e crimes that non-traditional people suffer from and apparently schools and public libraries have agreed to host events for that purpose.

I'm not sure how I feel about that. I agree that children that age, for the most part, haven't developed into little bigots yet so it makes sense to open their minds to accepting people for who they are, but I don't know if it really works. I remember going to school in the 70's and all those visits from cops to talk about drugs and how bad they are and 5 years later in high school were ALL doing drugs.

I don't think there's much risk of a few isolated events converting the kids into t******s, if that's what you're worried about but I think the risk of offending parents is high enough to give it more careful consideration. One thing I WILL say is that I think parents should be notified first AND allowed to excuse their children from the event. As much as I h**e how so many young children are g***med by their own parents to be h**eful bigots, I have to draw a line somewhere and I'm not quite ready to accept a statutory overruling of parental control for children in grade school.

TommyRadd wrote:

“D.C. Public Schools host d**g q***n performance for high school students…
“The D.C. Public Schools is hosting a d**g q***n performance as part of a p***e month celebration for high school students to celebrate during the last month of classes.
“The event comes as public schools in Pennsylvania, Iowa, Colorado, New York, Illinois and other states have increasingly made d**g q***n shows and story hours a featured part of “family-friendly” June p***e month celebrations, sparking outrage among conservatives.
“Chancellor Lewis D. Ferebee announced the “Leading with P***e!” celebration at the Ballou STAY public school campus in an email to DCPS families on Thursday night.”https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/jun/3/dc-public-schools-host-d**g-queen-performance-high/
br “D.C. Public Schools host d**g q***n performan... (show quote)

Yeah, I don't really see a problem here. By the time kids reach high school, they've developed a better sense of judgement for themselves and these are shows that students (and parents) are invited to, they are not forced on them. I consider this a non-issue.

TommyRadd wrote:

“D**g Q***ns in the Classroom Teach Inclusion and Fun, Offering a World of Imagination…
“Q***r communities in the United States are under attack. Across the country, legislators are passing bills banning certain g****r affirming care for t***s youth, prohibiting teachers from talking about L***Q+ identity in the classroom, mandating what sports teams t***s kids can and can’t play on, and much more. One of the most recent flashpoints in an ongoing series of assaults on q***r bodies, spaces, and fundamental rights has been kid-oriented p***e events, specifically ones that feature d**g q***ns.
“Once at home only in dimly-lit gay bars after sundown, d**g performers have recently stepped into the spotlight as mainstream media stars, thanks largely to Emmy Award-winning television series RuPaul’s D**g Race, which debuted in 2009. More recently still, they’ve moved into the fluorescent lights of educational spaces, like schools, libraries, and bookstores, through the work of organizations like D**g Q***n Story Hour (DQSH) and Queens of the Castro…”

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/d**g-queens-in-the-classroom
br “D**g Q***ns in the Classroom Teach Inclusion ... (show quote)

OK.. take a look at the picture on this one... You don't think something like that is more likely enough to head a child in the opposite direction? LOL... Seriously though... this article doesn't mention ANYTHING about d**g q***ns in schools. It mentions a number of events planned outside of schools where again, no one is forced to attend.

One thing I did pick up on while reading this article is the increased political pressure from the right to target people who don't fit into the "normal" category by denying them access to services etc... WTF is that all about? It seems the more the right tries to oppress these people the more they try to get people to accept them. I'm thinking you could be creating your own problems.

TommyRadd wrote:

Do you really not understand the difference between male actors dressing as women in plays versus men dressing as women to go to public schools to indoctrinate young innocent yet impressionable minds towards homosexuality?

Do YOU understand the difference between a d**g q***ns and homosexuals? My understanding is that most d**g q***ns are in fact straight not gay. Ya know, I almost suspect that you're paranoia comes from your own lack of sexual confidence. Maybe you've had a few moments where you wanted to wear a dress and got a little freaked out about it and you're just assuming everyone else is the same?

In any case, I don't see ANY indication in ANY of the articles you linked to that these d**g q***ns are advocating homosexuality.

TommyRadd wrote:

Honestly, I can’t bring myself to envision any conversation you and I may have going well if you can’t see, accept, and understand the gravity of the perverseness this topic, and the differences between actors and sexual d*****ts being allowed to influence young children for the sole purpose of making their deviance openly socially acceptable. I mean, society should be outraged if it were prostitutes going to “prostitute hour” to teach kids it’s okay to visit whores.

I dunno... you're obsessive reactions here are making me wonder about you. And who says it's perverted or d*****t anyway? That's your opinion. As far as I'm concerned, f**k your opinion. They aren't hurting anyone, they aren't stealing anything, they're not breaking any laws. So they like to wear dresses and do show tunes or wh**ever, big deal! As far as I'm concerned all this fuss amounts to one thing... an assault on the freedom of expression.

TommyRadd wrote:

Does that make me “prostitution-phobic”. If not, why would you accuse me of being “h********c”?

Well, at this point I think it's pretty obvious that you're h********c. When people act like homosexuals or "suspected" homosexuals are on the verge of converting them or others to homosexuality, that's pretty much what h********c means.

TommyRadd wrote:

This is not about homophobia.

Oh, I think it is.

TommyRadd wrote:

This is about, What do things that adults do in their bedrooms have to with what underage children are taught in school?

No it isn't. I mean... maybe YOU dress up like a women in your bedroom, but for most people like myself, the activity reserved for the bedroom is... well, sex and that isn't what these d**g q***ns are demonstrating. Even the articles you brought up yourself describe their objectives as helping children to understand the freedom of being who you want to be and the to accept others for who they want to be. I think your paranoia is ridiculous and your opposition to their freedom of expression is a serious problem. As a freedom-loving American, I will go toe-to-toe with you on this. And trust me, you won't win.

TommyRadd wrote:

So, are you ready to admit you were wrong in claiming there are no “d**g q***n hours” in schools?

I'm actually one of the few people on this site that does actually admit to being wrong... when I am. But your exaggerations were giving me the impression that you were talking about a wide-spread curriculum change to allow "d**g q***n hour" as a regular part of education. So, I'm not going to withdraw my statement because nothing you presented says that's the case. But I will adjust my statement because ONE of the articles did show evidence that d**g q***ns have made isolated visits to schools in NYC. So here's my revision...

D**g q***ns are not an integral part of school curriculum, that's just another h********c exaggeration.

Better?


Reply
Feb 26, 2023 14:15:33   #
Rose42
 
straightUp wrote:
Oh, you mean my ability to pick apart arguments while maintaining a cheery disposition? :) - Yeah, that drives right-wing f*****ts up the wall... ("You arrogant POS!" - LOL) It's one of the things I am frequently complimented on by people who really don't like the views that you seem to subscribe to.

Anything else?


No, your arrogance which is on display again in that post. Also your rather easy acquiesence to the ‘right wing f*****t’ propaganda - just as some on the right. In fact, I have seen you repeat silly propaganda as if it were t***h. In that respect you’re no different than one on the right who does the same with right wing propaganda

You greatly overvalue the quality of your posts.

Reply
Page 1 of 2 next>
If you want to reply, then register here. Registration is free and your account is created instantly, so you can post right away.
Main
Home | Latest Digest | Back to Top | All Sections
Contact us | Privacy policy | Terms of use | DMCA
OnePoliticalPlaza.com - Forum
Copyright 2012-2024 IDF International Technologies, Inc.