Federal NEVI EV charger program cancelled

[JRock]

Or you can get behind school choice and let parent's decide where they want to send their kids and the money follows their choice.

Actually, you do have a choice. I’ve always supported my public schools with my tax dollars, but wanted my kids to have a Catholic education, so I sent them to parochial schools. And because I made that choice, I never whined about the costs passed on to me to fund public education. It’s my responsibility in my community.
As for trashing our public schools, I’d remind folks here, that millions of people from around the world send their kids here to be educated.

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[JRock]

Regarding foreign aid, it’s a complex topic. China is sending billions every year to Africa, securing mineral rights preferences among other things. The same minerals we need for EV batteries. The US dropping foreign aid means the door opens for Russia and China.

https://www.sais-cari.org/data-chinese-global-foreign-aid

ABSOLUTELY RIGHT.
This isolationism is incredibly shortsighted. History is replete with examples of the dangers of isolation.

 

[JRock]

Foreign aid is a great way to launder money and get kickbacks. It's corrupt, and needs to go.

Yeah, defense contractors who just happen to be set up in all 50 states would never artificially inflate prices, or skim off the top. Their executives are living hand to mouth.
And for everyone here justifying their support for killing foreign aid by saying that we should also cut defense spending, I would suggest that those two places to cut, should be tied together. If they can’t get defense cuts, they don’t get foreign aid cuts. Defense cuts will never and have never been cut in my 63 years.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Regarding foreign aid, it’s a complex topic. China is sending billions every year to Africa, securing mineral rights preferences among other things. The same minerals we need for EV batteries. The US dropping foreign aid means the door opens for Russia and China.

https://www.sais-cari.org/data-chinese-global-foreign-aid

So foreign aid is bribery but we should continue doing it? Which is it, foreign aid is to help the poor or secure mineral rights?

 

[shap]

Actually, you do have a choice. I’ve always supported my public schools with my tax dollars, but wanted my kids to have a Catholic education, so I sent them to parochial schools. And because I made that choice, I never whined about the costs passed on to me to fund public education. It’s my responsibility in my community.
As for trashing our public schools, I’d remind folks here, that millions of people from around the world send their kids here to be educated.

Well, that was the point mentioned above - you need to be rich to be able to have a choice. If not you end up in public schools with not the best results for you. Unless you live in very rich neighborhood, where public schools are good enough. And you can afford this if you are... rich...

And millions of people that send their kids to schools - whom you are talking about? You can not send kids to schools in US (not talking about colleges).

 

[shap]

So foreign aid is bribery but we should continue doing it? Which is it, foreign aid is to help the poor or secure mineral rights?

I think another point here is that even with bribery USAID did not do well - as China basically bought the whole of Africa in the last 3 decades...

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Actually, you do have a choice. I’ve always supported my public schools with my tax dollars, but wanted my kids to have a Catholic education, so I sent them to parochial schools. And because I made that choice, I never whined about the costs passed on to me to fund public education. It’s my responsibility in my community.
As for trashing our public schools, I’d remind folks here, that millions of people from around the world send their kids here to be educated.

So you paid double just so your kids could get a decent education and to you this system is functioning properly? If public schools were so great you would have sent your kids there. You didn’t, yet you don’t want to change things. You don’t see an issue with that? Why not use the money we already spend to fix the problem instead of people who can paying double and those who can’t stuck with going to the schools that weren’t good enough for your

Yeah, defense contractors who just happen to be set up in all 50 states would never artificially inflate prices, or skim off the top. Their executives are living hand to mouth.
And for everyone here justifying their support for killing foreign aid by saying that we should also cut defense spending, I would suggest that those two places to cut, should be tied together. If they can’t get defense cuts, they don’t get foreign aid cuts. Defense cuts will never and have never been cut in my 63 years.

What’s with this false dichotomy? We should get defense cuts too. I’ll make this simple for you, one dollar wasted is one dollar too many. I don’t care where the dollar is wasted I want it to stop. That means defense cuts too, the only people arguing for continued government waste are those arguing for these wasteful agencies.

 

[shap]

Yeah, defense contractors who just happen to be set up in all 50 states would never artificially inflate prices, or skim off the top. Their executives are living hand to mouth.
And for everyone here justifying their support for killing foreign aid by saying that we should also cut defense spending, I would suggest that those two places to cut, should be tied together. If they can’t get defense cuts, they don’t get foreign aid cuts. Defense cuts will never and have never been cut in my 63 years.

Let's wait and see. Maybe you will be surprised. As great Nicholson said in a famous movie - at least I tried ...

 

[Captblue]

Well, that was the point mentioned above - you need to be rich to be able to have a choice. If not you end up in public schools with not the best results for you. Unless you live in very rich neighborhood, where public schools are good enough. And you can afford this if you are rich...

And millions of people that send their kids to schools - who you are talking about? You can not send kids to schools in US (not talking about colleges).

Not having a choice is not the problem. I am a product of a poor city school district, I turn out ok. The problems are not the schools, teachers or the $. The problems are the parents ( if you are lucky to have two). You need a role model with good working ethics and Christian values.

 

[shap]

Not having a choice is not the problem. I am a product of a poor city school district, I turn out ok. The problems are not the schools, teachers or the $. The problems are the parents ( if you are lucky to have two). You need a role model with good working ethics and Christian values.

It is all together, and one thing can balance the other. No question that 2 good parents give you a huge boost. I had one, was living in so so neighborhood but went to a good school. Having a choice is important IMHO. For some - it will be a school, for others - family

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Not having a choice is not the problem. I am a product of a poor city school district, I turn out ok. The problems are not the schools, teachers or the $. The problems are the parents ( if you are lucky to have two). You need a role model with good working ethics and Christian values.

You are correct about the students causing the problems. They disrupt class with major behavioral issues and take up all the resources. They vandalize the buildings and start fights with the students and staff. They deal drugs and use in school as well.

What about all the poor kids who come from good families, barely getting by, and who also go to these schools? The kids with instilled values but their parents cannot afford to move or send them to a private school? They are still dealing with these same schools and no resources are left for them.

Under school choice, these kids could get out of these bad schools and go to a private school. The bad kids get kicked out of those schools so they aren't disruptive to the other students.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

Let's wait and see. Maybe you will be surprised. As great Nicholson said in a famous movie - at least I tried ...

If the goal is no government waste, eliminating any waste is a step in the right direction. The government has zero accountability for dollars spent. Cutting funding for wasteful agencies and shining the light on how badly our tax dollars are managed will only help people realize that our government has been spending wastefully for far too long. Maybe this guy will get to defense spending, maybe the next guy will make it their mission to tackle it next, but the point is every dollar clawed back is one that can be spent on some of our problems.


I don't see how anyone can argue for the existence of foreign aid when our country is trillions of dollars in debt and getting further in debt daily. When we have poor and starving people here in our country, when mentally ill people cannot get treatment and often resort to crime against fellow citizens, then they just get shipped off to prisons. Spending those aid dollars domestically not only helps suffering people, but it has the added bonus of helping some of them become productive, increasing our tax base and lowering our crime rates. We get double effectiveness helping our own poor.

If the foreign aid is used to secure influence in exchange for monetary kickbacks, that is called bribery. It is illegal if I do that; our government shouldn't do it either. If I wanted to build a business in a restricted area or get access to resources I otherwise wouldn't have access to and I gave a ton of money to a politician or community under the guise of aid that would be illegal and immoral, why do we want our government to act this way?

We can do it without bribery if we need to secure mining rights or access to resources. By giving it in the form of aid, there is no accountability and no guarantee that the money is used the way we want it.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

I'm not afraid of audits. That's what the inspectors general and GAO and other congressional agencies are for.

Best wishes!

In your view, we already have an audit process, so we do not need to do anything else. The fact that we already have a process means one of two things: Either this process is working correctly, and we have no government waste and corruption, or it isn't working, and we should try something else.

I hope you aren't arguing that we have no waste or corruption, as we most certainly do. I don't know if the way we are going about it is the best way to do it. I'm not a political scientist. I do know that the way we did it before wasn't working.

 

[Donald Stanfield]

ABSOLUTELY RIGHT.
This isolationism is incredibly shortsighted. History is replete with examples of the dangers of isolation.

We had isolationist policies during one of the most prosperous times in US history. Not to mention, you're arguing a false dichotomy again. Shutting down one corrupt foreign aid agency doesn't equate to isolationism. No one is arguing that the US should stop trading with foreign governments. The current administration wants to renegotiate bad trade deals, not stop trade. Those are two different things.

Countries like China already have a massive trade deficit and tariffs that amount to an embargo on US goods. It should have never been allowed to get that one-sided in the first place. We need to face facts here; in its current state, our government is unsustainable. The US loses power and influence every year. Our infrastructure is crumbling, and our people are getting dumber and less motivated.

We must look inwards and start fixing the structural problems with our government and country. That 40 billion dollars of yearly "aid" could be fixing our crumbling bridges and roads, building homes to deal with the shortage, or hardening our electrical grid. We could create job programs that teach citizens skills instead of importing the people we need on H1Bs. We could just put that money right towards the deficit, and it would be a better use than giving it to foreign nations for nothing in return.

 

[Zoidz]

So foreign aid is bribery but we should continue doing it? Which is it, foreign aid is to help the poor or secure mineral rights?

Both, just as it has been for centuries around the world by all countries with foreign interests. It's a complex topic.

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