"Compassionate Conservativism" Fails the Test

Parent Cafe
101

<p>Which conservatives support higher state taxes? Federal tax rates have come down from 90% in 1960 and from 70% in 1980. Capital gains taxes and dividend tax rates are down to 15%. </p>

<p>The federal government is taking in 16% of GDP right now, the lowest in my lifetime and yours. So who is pushing for higher state taxes?</p>

<p>Oh, and we are fighting a war with Republicans in power and this is the first time that I know of that we had tax cuts at the same time we are fighting a war.</p>

<p>By the way, how much does Harvard receive form the federal and state govenment every year?</p>

<p>Princeton.
<a href=“https://www.princeton.edu/pr/aid/appl/06.html[/url]”>https://www.princeton.edu/pr/aid/appl/06.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>What should be highlighted?</p>

<p>"Students are expected to contribute 5 percent of their assets each year to their education. Student assets are defined as money that is in the student’s name at the time he or she applies for aid. This includes funds that have been placed in a trust or given to the student under the Uniform Gift to Minors Act.</p>

<p>Additional sources of student contributions are “Veterans Administration” and other educational benefits"</p>

<p>.External scholarships and grants</p>

<p>An important part of Princeton’s aid program is the expectation that students will receive scholarships from non-University sources. These scholarships, when combined with Princeton’s own funds, enable the University to meet the full need of all undergraduates. Applicants who win an outside award are required to notify the Financial Aid Office.</p>

<p>As an encouragement to apply for external scholarships, outside aid reduces or eliminates the term and summer job expectations. The Princeton grant is reduced only after these student work requirements have been eliminated. This policy of earnings reduction does not apply to the government grants described below.</p>

<p>Federal Pell Grants are funded by the government. Aid applicants apply for a Pell Grant (an award that currently ranges from $400 to $4,050) by filing the FAFSA.</p>

<p>Another source of government funds that can be used at Princeton is a state scholarship or grant. Residents of the following states may qualify for an award: Alaska, the District of Columbia, New Jersey, Rhode Island, and Vermont. Students should apply for state aid by completing the FAFSA and, in some cases, a separate state application. Applicants should contact either their high school guidance office or the state grant agency for more information.</p>

102

<p>Rich Colleges Receiving Richest Share of US Aid <a href=“http://www.pipeline.com/~rgibson/richcolleges.html[/url]”>http://www.pipeline.com/~rgibson/richcolleges.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

103

<p>Woodwork, I’m consistent with my private sector work and public sector expectations.</p>

104

<p>The Dad,</p>

<p>I never doubted it;)</p>

105

<p>Doesn’t change two fundamental facts:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>The best private schools are better than the best public schools.</p></li>
<li><p>Almost no one could afford the true cost of a private school, which is about $70,000 annually in tuition alone. There are huge contributions being made from private parties - who really believe that the education they received should be available to talented kids who could not otherwise afford it. It is utterly illogical and irrational to suggest that federal Pell grants are responsible for the fact that colleges are able to charge 1/2 of the actual cost of educating a student as “full price.” </p></li>
</ol>

<p>–</p>

<p>Um, maybe the federalists, who want power returned to the states?</p>

<p>Why would anyone support higher state taxes, when the federal gov’t has taken over virtually every facet of lawmaking, regulation, and social welfare? Perhaps, once those functions are returned to the states where they belong in the first place, we’ll have a different story. Now, what are you really paying a state to do? Regulate commerce? Nope, feds massacred the Constitution and took over that job a while back. Protect the environment? To some extent, yes, but the EPA does most of that. Social welfare? Wait, a lot of that is determined by the fed. gov’t as well. End result is that the federal gov’t controls the vast majority of our lives. Dems have loved that for 50 years because they were in power. A few more years of the Bush administration and they’ll be screaming for a return of power to their (blue) states - which, by the way, is something that I’m waiting for.</p>

106

<p>I’m sorry but I am not understanding you…</p>

<p>"You wrote this…Conservatives don’t think that every person should, by himself, rebuild New Orleans. I don’t know a single person who thinks that, and dahlin, you don’t either. So please, argue with real facts. Conservatives tend to think that this sort of disaster should be dealt with on the state level. The state is in a MUCH better position to know what it’s own problems are. If federal taxes are reduced, states can increase their taxes with no net increase (or loss) to the individual. Generally speaking, the smaller the unit, the more efficient money-managing there is - "</p>

<p>Then this…
"Um, maybe the federalists, who want power returned to the states?</p>

<p>Why would anyone support higher state taxes, when the federal gov’t has taken over virtually every facet of lawmaking, regulation, and social welfare? Perhaps, once those functions are returned to the states where they belong in the first place, we’ll have a different story. Now, what are you really paying a state to do? Regulate commerce? Nope, feds massacred the Constitution and took over that job a whil…"</p>

<p>Federal taxes are reduced and have been reduced for a long time. We now pay the lowest taxes to the federal government in our lifetime. We pay only 16% of GDP to the federal government (while the federal government spends 19% to 20%). So when is it OK for states to raise taxes?</p>

<p>When you are comparing private schools to public schools you are comparing apples and oranges except for one thing. They are both on the federal dole.</p>

<p>Harvard gets over $300 million a year from the federal government for research (not including their medical center) every year. </p>

<p>I am arguing that conservatives these days don’t want to cut federal spending. They just want to cut it for the other guy and have the spending spent on them.</p>

<p>Conservatives can argue all they want about the charity they do. They also support policies that crush the lower and lower middle classes. </p>

<p>Groucho Marx once said that “Military Intelligence” is a contradiction in terms.</p>

<p>So is “Compassionate Conservativism”.</p>

107

<p>

One of the best quote’s I’ve seen on CC.</p>

108

<p>Funding for research for Harvard is, unless I’m severely mistaken, not something that reduces undergraduate tuition. It’s just that - funding for research that the gov’t (under both liberal and conservative administrations) is giving out because it hopes our lives will improve with it. It also attempts to correct for a market failure: there is often not enough incentive for private entitites to develop new technologies or do research on their own. H’s funding amounts to $1 per person per year from each US citizen. Astronomical!</p>

<p>And let me get this straight: is a liberal complaining about how the gov’t gives out tax dollars to support radically liberal professors?</p>

<p>If you choose to ignore my points, fine - but please don’t couch it in the terms of not understanding what I’m saying or miscelleneous comments. The fact that Harvard receives federal funding is comically beside the point that it is a better institution than UMass Amherst.</p>

<p>Must say… I absolutely love how liberals claim that we are all evil and that it’s all about tax breaks to the wealthy. (Personally, I would like to increase taxes on the truly wealthy - the Teresa Kerry’s of the world who pay about 10% of their income in taxes. Gotta love how the liberals weren’t talking about taxing her.) Perhaps it’s because you just don’t want to see the libertarians and caring conservatives who are trying to distinguish themselves from the others in their party… maybe because it just doesn’t fit with an extremely biased, narrow, stereotypical view of someone you don’t happen to agree with.</p>

<p>Federal tax rates decrease when wages (and other gains) increase - the “rate” is only half the equation. Revenue = total taxable income * tax rate. </p>

<p>Maybe some of us support lower tax rates because it’s an incentive to work and be educated. When I graduate from law school, the best-case scenario I have actually involves making less per hour, after taxes, than I did as an engineer. In that situation, why bother with education and working extra hours (thereby increasing national productivity and a similar demand for services - a two-fold economic benefit) if there isn’t much of a return? (Answer for me is that it’s doing what I love and would prefer to do, but that isn’t an economic or political argument.)</p>

109

<p>I got a call from a group that wants me to a join a business group sponsered by NY US Rep Reynolds. Essentially, I told them to balance the budget…That every pledge that This adminstration and majority party has never been kept. I wonder if Zell Miller made another mistake in switching political parties.</p>

<p>As for FF comment: Yes, its a good quote, I just wish the party in power believes it-so far they don’t. Bunch of idiots.</p>

110

<p>ariesathena, I’m fiscally conservative and socially liberal.</p>

<p>I never said funding for research reduces undergraduate tuition. </p>

<p>I am saying that the private schools you love also feed at the federal government trough. </p>

<p>You don’t object to that either, do you? Why, because you support government spending when it supports what you want.</p>

<p>When we don’t want to support something in this country like welfare for the poor, we demonize the poor, say they aren’t good enough for the money, it would be a waste to give them money, they don’t work hard for the money.
After we demonize them, we can feel better about ourselves when we don’t give them the money. You just have to read a few of the earlier posts to see that in action.</p>

<p>Revenue = total taxable income* tax rate.</p>

<p>Government revenue as a share of GDP hasn’t been lower in your lifetime.
You are not going to get the lower tax rates in your big money years. Sorry. We are spending like drunken sailors and the demographic time bomb is ticking.</p>

<p>You are going to get higher tax rates. We all are. Higher than they should be. </p>

<p>I really am sorry because I do support low tax rates and the Republicans blew it. As a former Republican, I’m really disappointed.</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/02/AR2005120201413.html?nav=rss_business[/url]”>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/12/02/AR2005120201413.html?nav=rss_business&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>If you have a half hour, Rubin’s speech is very good.</p>

<p><a href=“http://whitman.syr.edu/about/news.asp?id=140[/url]”>http://whitman.syr.edu/about/news.asp?id=140&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

111

<p>Well, about 40% of every dollar for research gets taken off the top to support university overhead and facilities. At least a large portion of this benefits undergrads using the libraries and other facilities as well as getting to work on the research directly.</p>

112

<p>I agree with barron’s post 111, undergraduates can benefit from research dollars, by keeping their curricullum content current and on the edge, by increases to the knowledge base, and through jobs. I also know that sometimes research will compete with teaching duties and reduce student access to professors, but I think the gain is more than the loss in most schools.</p>

<p>I don’t agree with the post 105’s statement that the best private schools are better than the best public schools…I am not at all sure we would agree on what the word “best” means. To relate that to this OP’s topic. Conservatives who justify spending $30,000 a year on their child’s private school education will donate money to keep politicians from raising the support given to public school education. Then they will pretend that the SAT score their child got after taking the $1000 prep course (in addition to the prep school support) proves they are better students than the kid who took the day off from work to test once with very little support (since counseling services are frequently underfunded at many public high schools). These same conservatives will support mandatory expulsion for discipline issues (drugs and violence) but will not support funding programs to help public schools respond to these problems. Compassionate conservatives fail the education test.</p>

113

<p>I find the “enlightenment” of liberals nothing short of amazing - they know so much, they even know my own beliefs better than I do! </p>

<p>COMPASSIONATE conservatives are NOT LIKE CONSERVATIVES. Got it? Or are y’all still struggling with the concept?</p>

<p>I come from a very, very Republican family. I went to public school, K-12. When I was 18 (and until I changed my residency to another state), I went home every single time there was a local election to vote for more funding for the public schools. My parents voted likewise. My sis voted by absentee ballot to fund the public schools. It was almost comical - every few months, I would get a phone call, telling me to come home and vote for Prop 2 1/2 overrides to get more funding for the public schools. </p>

<p>Lest you think that this was someone else’s money… my family is one of the hardest-hit families when those tax increases went through (maybe only one or two houses in the town had more of a tax increase). They said it would be cheaper to move to another town and send the kids to private school, but they believe in public school education, so they’ll vote for higher taxes to fund it.</p>

<p>I know some families who are hard-core Democrats who think, “Why fund the public schools? My kids have graduated.” Or “Why should my taxes go up? Don’t I pay enough already?” Or my favourite, “Why should we have smaller classes? My generation had 40 kids to a class and no one complained.” Hum… how about the fact that you’re mainstreaming learning disabled kids, which is a great thing, but that requries smaller classes? </p>

<p>…but apparently, Mr. B knows more about my voting habits than I do. Or maybe it’s just that LIBERALS flunk the education test and my compassionate family is doing well.</p>

<p>I could have gotten a free ride to the State U - pretty automatic, considering my scores and grades. Would it be right for the taxpayers to foot the bill for me? For me to take the place of another student who can’t afford private college? Should I be chastised for going to two private colleges - and paying my way through the second? </p>

<p>I’m a zillion dollars in educational debt but donate what little I have to my alma mater, and, to the extent that I can, specify that it go to financial aid. </p>

<p>…but I guess I’m failing the education test because I’m a registered Republican.</p>

<p>I never took a single prep course - not for the SATs (800 math, 750 verbal, one sitting, no re-takes) nor the LSATs (98th percentile). Does the fact that I spent $29.95 of my own money on the LSAT prep book make me uncompassionate? Does my 1550 make me uncompassionate, or is it the result of just being a nerd (no, my parents couldn’t understand the nerdishness - I’m the scholar of the family)? </p>

<p>Would it surprise you if I said that my mom never graduated from college and my dad, in his words, “passed and got [his] diploma?” Would it surprise you if I said that, once I got beyond middle school, I was on my own for my academics? That my parents would have been happy with Bs, but I was the one who insisted on bringing home the As? That my SATs and LSATs were the result of me, with the prep work of the SATs being, oh, picking up my #2 pencil before I went there? </p>

<p>So easy to stereotype. So very wrong. </p>

<p>How about the fact that I was known in high school as the girl who thought prep courses were b.s. and said so, to the faces of the people who took them? That I was 16 and told people that they were buying their scores - that it was a measure not of their intelligence or test-taking ability, but of the unchecked ambition of their parents, who shelled out $300 for the course? </p>

<p>But of course, even if I think that, say that, decry the test prep business, and spend my own time to tutor lower-class kids in the SAT, I must be uncompassionate. Never thought that silly number determined my personal worth (or lack thereof, which is what you postulate), but there you go! It does!</p>

<p>Your logic is also extremely flawed - while we cannot agree on what “best” means, I think almost any definition of “best” school would not include the state schools. They would include AWS, HYP, CalTech, Pomona, whatever - but no one is saying that the “best” education in a general sense is available at state schools. That’s like saying that since we can’t accurately measure intelligence, we can’t say that the people at Yale are smarter than the people at Bunker Hill community college. Or since we can’t measure athletic ability, that Michael Jordan is no better a basketball player than your average 10-year-old who plays video games all day.</p>

<p>It’s very convenient for y’all to pretend that compassionate conservatives are these ficticious creatures that y’all make up - but in reality, we aren’t. I’m arguing real, live, actual people, and the rest of you are arguing about stereotypes that conveniently fit your argument. Try facts. Try statistics. Try someone you actually know. But there is a lot of straight-up dishonesty in what you guys are arguing: you use a common term and then invent behaviour… then say that people who use the term are evil. It’s sick. It’s like me saying that all liberals fail the “honesty” test, because there are liberals who will steal from the Gap to punish them for the conditions of workers in third world countries (yes, I know liberals who have done this). </p>

<p>51% of the country voted for Bush. Last time I checked, 51% of the country doesn’t put their kids in private high schools; doesn’t spend ungodly sums of money lobbying for special treatment; and doesn’t pay for private college counselors; ergo, sometime or another, y’all will have to use your God-given intelligence to realize that not all conservatives act that way. Basic statistics: what is your correlation? You hypothesize that conservatives generally act in certain ways, and therefore, there is no such thing as a compassionate conservative. I want numbers. Seriously. Y’all think we don’t exist - so prove it. (Ann Coulter is right - liberals quake when asked to back anything up with actual facts.) What is the correlation? 50%? 2%? 1%? 0%? How many people who call themselves compassionate conservatives engage in those behaviours? </p>

<p>Sure, it’ll hurt your agenda, but embrace the fact that a lot of us don’t like big business, obsence CEO salaries (yeah, I took basic economics: it’s akin to a monopoly, where the benefit to those individuals is less than the burden on society, so there’s dead weight loss), underfunding public schools, or the like. I would just prefer to fund the public school (or any other programme) through state and local taxes - it’s more economically efficient than funding such things through the federal gov’t - basic issue that the more steps you add in, the more you’ll spend in overhead and inefficiency wastes.</p>

<p>So what it comes down to is you don’t agree with me because you just don’t, on a gut level, agree with me. That’s fine. What isn’t fine are the lies, the dishonesty, and the intellectual emptiness of your arguments. All hell would break loose if I were to change “compassionate conservative” to “Muslim” and “conservative” to “terrorist,” then conclude that members of Islam are all terrorists. Because that’s really your argument.</p>

114

<p>Why are you a Republican? Is it the low tax rates? It can’t be controlling federal government spending because that isn’t happening.</p>

115

<p>I’m wondering if compassionate conservatives made it through without help and figure…“if I can do it, so can any other person”. You obviously Were not living where bullets rang out from every street corner and there were gangs making walking to school difficult?? Was your family washed out by a flood and now have no home or school or job and the government just reneged on helping you. AND when asked for help right when the flood was happening, the government didn’t bother responding. (see CNN today.) You sound like you had a regular old middle class background, with parents who made it solidly into middle class if not more by working hard.
I see you have no compunction in throwing away your roots… compassionate conservatives are busy killing off the middle class by voting for Bush and his business cronies and the outsourcing of jobs and the import of cheap labor. You say you don’t like high CEO salaries, then why are you voting for the party of CEO’s and buying patronage??? Wake up and smell the pay-offs and lobbyists. Dstark was right, do you even know what your current favorite admin stands for?? Why are you backing them?? For one issue??
I was working so I didn’t have time to answer your previous diatribe, but man, there are tons of facts to back us up. But compassionate conservative don’t “believe” facts. We’ve given them over and over and you just reject the real facts… See my favorite "<a href=“http://www.mediamatters.com”>www.mediamatters.com</a> for corrections for most of Ann Coulter’s ridiculous and inaccurate comments. If you get your facts from Fox or Ann Coulter, we’ve already won the argument…BTW, while there you can get corrections to most of the other biggies on Fox’s inaccurate comments, as well.</p>

<p>Oh and by the way, it’s been shown that many people will vote against their own interests in elections…if given one reason…like a scare tactic, like homosexual marriage or abortion, they will time after time vote against their own economic interests, so don’t tell me 51% Voted for Bush…they voted out of fear (terrorists…etc).
You are different than conservatives…they don’t like big big deficits…that’s right…they’re CONSERVATIVE. You are more for war mongering (the neocons designed and started the war…don’t like to spend money do we???) . They will gladly spend heavy duty money…on war, not social goods. I’d rather educate and feed people, then terrorize, torture and then kill them. Who is the compassionate one??? Bush is a neo-con and a war monger, he just uses the title Compassionate conservative to attract people, like you, to buy into his agenda. Seeing the polls I see most people now feel duped. Why don’t you? What about him is compassionate? He mandates improved educatoin and then cuts the funding? How possibly can you see good in him if you are a real compassionate conservative, as you claim. He names a veteranarian to head woman’s health issues, he allows more air pollution and arsenic in the water. Where is his compassion???</p>

116

<p>Another thing that “compassionate” conservatives have problems with is that it isn’t always about them! Aries, if I wasn’t describing you, I wasn’t describing you! Anyone who wants tax breaks while burdening America’s children with debt is too self centered and needs to think of others more.</p>

117

<p>I’m a Republican because of people like lauras50.</p>

118

<p>Were you a Republican when you were at Wisconsin?</p>

119

<p>that I belong to the political party that is in power (which/whomever). This way, when they ask me for money, I can tell them to GTH, I’m voting, … !</p>

120

<p>Barrons, you really say stupid things sometimes. What about what I said made you want to run the other way? Caring for people, not wanting to make war? What?? I am compassionate, I’ve spent my whole life helping people get jobs. What about backing people instead of waging war to spread democracy makes you upset?
Which Republican are you ?? There seems to be an unstable coalition right now…the neo cons (compassionate conservatives) the religious right, the real conservatives, the moderates and the libertarians. None of them agrees on much. Which do you agree with??? The coalition is falling apart anyway. Enjoy the downfall, I know I am!
BTW, another urban myth was crunched this morning. The governor of LA did ask for help, absolutely screamed for help and got nothing but ineptitude and some PR advice after Katrina from the Feds. THEN the admin smears her by saying she didn’t ask for help. Do you know how many times my conservative friends told me…she didn’t ask for help. There are NO FACTS in the Republican party. They’re all made up lies. AND you wonder why we’re upset??? How many times can you be lied to and still buy the that there is any truth to this admin at all? Maybe you ought to question whether your allegiance is being given to a group that doesn’t deserve that trust.</p>