nigel99

I think you missed my point (but then at the moment I’m dosed up on opioids so good chance in a few weeks I look back and see my posts were as coherent as Rich’s.). Often people who grow up in welfare don’t have the life skills to work. It’s not a judgement, I don’t see them as evil dole bludgers. I don’t know how you teach those skills, but a short stint in the military seems like an ideal opportunity.

My ex came from a “career welfare” family. Her father had never had a job and she really struggled with me working as she was used to her father and previous partners being home all day. There are a reasonable number of people who deliberately blow interviews in order to remain on our jobseekers payment system. Many people like my ex who are from generations of welfare lack the skills to work, and I don’t just mean having a trade or qualification. It’s incredibly sad and I don’t judge them. Many of my relatives had to do a year of compulsory military service growing up. A six to 12 month mandatory service sounds like a good thing.

I meant within western countries, rather than third world. I did a uni assignment last year looking at paid parental leave policies. It was very interesting. Finland has a good system of 70% of your income as parental leave.

Playing devils advocate, although it’s interesting that Windsor isn’t towing the MAGA line where they want more babies not less. I believe the stats show that the poor and disadvantaged tend to have more children than the wealthy and more educated. I know Musk is doing his best to single handedly make up the difference:) I’m not equating poor with stupid. But shouldn’t we be trying to address the balance? I’d like see the tax structures changed to make it easier for one parent to stay home for the children, rather than child care credits etc. I believe a lot of our modern problems are due to the breakdown of the family unit and children having a parent looking after them. I’m not suggesting it should be the mother, either parent is fine.

This is actually quite an interesting moral question in western society that has welfare (including Australia). Should people be ‘forced’ to work in manual/low paid jobs rather than welfare?

https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/australian-mma-coach-says-he-was-detained-by-us-immigration-officials/jwrd9lhvt Australia’s head coach for the MMA team was detained for 24 hours due to a mistake on his visa. A growing number of countries are updating their travel warnings from green to yellow for the US. It’s incredibly sad as I enjoy visiting the states, but there’s no way I’m risking it anytime soon .

https://theonion.com/u-s-offers-platinumplus-preferred-citizenship-1819564488/ An onion article from the 90’s is not longer satire.

Well here’s an alternative view on how tariffs work. Donny thinks that the drug dealers are paying tariffs on fentanyl.

True, although I was thinking about the boycott campaigns causing other nations to look elsewhere. For example my local supermarket sells American oranges. If consumer boycotts cause them to buy elsewhere, what is the incentive to go back?

Yes I heard that part. You’re right nobody is going to want to buy a pair of Nikes made in the USA that cost 10x the current price. The other issue is that anti US sentiment is high and Boycott USA movement is gaining a lot of traction. Our government has started pumping money into a Buy Aussie campaign and although not as strong as the Canadian and EU movements people are actively boycotting American products. Once supply chains shift, it’s going to be very hard to get them back.

I stumbled across this YouTube video and found it quite interesting. I realise it’s a 20 minute video, but the presenter lays out how this is a high risk but potentially viable solution to the US retaining its global role. I don’t understand history and global economics enough to know if it’s complete drivel. https://youtu.be/1ts5wJ6OfzA?si=tMBqy0MuORPp5j2C

I saw an interesting article that shows how it’s quite plausible that Trump used ChatGbt to calculate the tariffs.

The USA has placed tariffs on Heard and McDonald Islands. They have a total human population of 0. That will teach those penguins a lesson!

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/keith-self-quotes-joseph-goebbels-nazi-congress_n_67ed7d19e4b0b937ab8f59d5 Nothing alarming at all about a republican senator quoting a nazi propagandist on the role that the government should play in the media.

Considering the pace of the anti DEI actions, the stripping of laws protecting women and non whites and apathy of politicians and the people on stopping it, there’s a good chance only white males will be allowed in 2028.