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Rock Du Jour - 4/29/22 - The New Intellectual Right and J.D. Vance and Exactly Who We're Voting For - Very Important, Folks! (1 Viewer)

Fight that. Politicization of the private life is antidemocratic, even if it appears in the guise of democracy. 
Oh, I agree. The private sphere is so important. Public displays without relentless politicization is necessary to breathe. 

All that is not forbidden is now compulsory. 

We need a new one for the politicization of everything. 

 
Look what Trump did is awful. It's a lousy choice foisted upon men when their president tries to tell them what they can or cannot do or say. But we need to ignore that impulse on the end to let him disrupt and politicize every last nth degree of our existence. That <expletive> ain't getting in here where we live and interact with each other. My poetry isn't political. My tv shows aren't political. My fiction isn't political. My personal life isn't political. My football isn't political. Screw him and the horse he rode in on.

 
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Lol and even as I say this here I get a text on my Saints group with a Breitbart article about how a bar in Louisiana won't be showing Saints games. This is someone I go to Saints games with and have for years. When I see him I will shut this #### town and tell him I want to talk football, and only football.

 
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Look what Trump did is awful. It's a lousy choice foisted upon men when their president tries to tell them what they can or cannot do or say. But we need to ignore that impulse on the end to let him disrupt and politicize every last nth degree of our existence. That <expletive> ain't getting in here where we live and interact with each other. My poetry isn't political. My tv shows aren't political. My fiction isn't political. My personal life isn't political. My football isn't political. Screw him and the horse he rode in on.
I liked your post, but some of the stuff you think isn't political is by its very existence. 

 
I liked your post, but some of the stuff you think isn't political is by its very existence. 
Thanks, I know you get what I mean, and I know what you mean. So ok yes art and private existence can be political but it shouldn't be politicized. So I may say I like Guernica the painting but that doesn't make me a communist degenerate, or I may say I've read The Rise & Fall of the Third Reich but that doesn't make me a fascist, etc.

Yes a player or a team may take a given stand or approach about civil rights or free speech, yes that's inherently political. But I can see it happening where watching the NFL or attending it or being a fan of a player is being branded a political act. That's politicization of a Kulturkampf or Cultural Revolution nature.

 
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Thanks, I know you get what I mean, and I know what you mean. So ok yes art and private existence can be political but it shouldn't be politicized. So I may say I like Guernica the painting but that doesn't make me a communist degenerate, or I may say I've read The Rise & Fall of the Third Reich but that doesn't make me a fascist, etc.

Yes a player or a team may take a given stand or approach about civil rights or free speech, yes that's inherently political. But I can see it happening where watching the NFL or attending it or being a fan of a player is being branded a political act. That's politicization of a Kulturkampf or Cultural Revolution nature.
Yeah, I agree with you.  

 
Look what Trump did is awful. It's a lousy choice foisted upon men when their president tries to tell them what they can or cannot do or say. But we need to ignore that impulse on the end to let him disrupt and politicize every last nth degree of our existence.
The best response to any troll is to ignore him. Unfortunately, it’s not realistic to expect the entire country, including all of its media, to simply ignore the President of the United States.

 
We will all be waiting with bated breath.
True story.  Until I was in my late teens I thought “bated breath” was a reference to “hot and heavy” while all by yourself. 

‘Bated breath. As in “I’m so excited waiting I had to ‘bate and now I’m breathing heavy.”

 
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True story.  Until I was in my late teens I thought “bated breath” was a reference to “hot and heavy” while all by yourself. 

‘Bated breath. As in “I’m so excited waiting I had to ‘bate and now I’m breathing heavy.”
No, no, no, it’s the breathing you hear on a  phone call with Louis C.K....

 
True story.  Until I was in my late teens I thought “bated breath” was a reference to “hot and heavy” while all by yourself. 

‘Bated breath. As in “I’m so excited waiting I had to ‘bate and now I’m breathing heavy.”
:lol:

And...

...on a related note...

...please do not ask what I thought "bating" bears and bulls meant until I was 45.... :bag:

:not-really-true: ;)

 
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The best response to any troll is to ignore him. Unfortunately, it’s not realistic to expect the entire country, including all of its media, to simply ignore the President of the United States.
Ok. Maybe I'll just speak for myself. I won't let him politicize my private life. So far it's been effective, for me personally. In these conversations I ask people 'why should the president affect what sports you watch or what movies you see or where you get your news?' The conversation usually endeth there.

 
Ok. Maybe I'll just speak for myself. I won't let him politicize my private life. So far it's been effective, for me personally. In these conversations I ask people 'why should the president affect what sports you watch or what movies you see or where you get your news?' The conversation usually endeth there.
It should. I had a conversation with my niece last night about the Theory Of Knowledge class she's taking in high school. She was talking about the de-Nazification of Germany and what that meant. I wish I'd gotten more than a moment with her, but this is what I wanted to talk about. The politicization of everything. How do you let the President affect your views on sports, art, etc.  

It's not that Trump is a Nazi; he's clearly not. Every person in the executive branch is a figurehead, and those heads shape culture, for better or worse.  

 
No, I think those issues needed their own thread and were backed up by the page hits. Given that, I'm going to start more topics in here rather than dominate the front page with interesting news from the weird world of Holly-Poli.  


I thought it would actually be welcomed by the board. 

:sniffs in a snit:  
All you need to do is title your new threads "zomg TRUMP!!!!!!1!", then noone will complain

 
Long on emotional anecdotes. Short on actual facts and policy.  Basically nothing on potential remedies.
I thought the same thing about the anecdotes. I didn't think it was short on actual facts and policy. Thought it was dense. 

The point about remedies was that there were none. It's a Ponzi scheme, essentially. That's why it's a swindle, SD. 

But your comment is well-taken. If you were looking for remedies, they're just aren't any. He's likening it to the bank debacle. Somebody is going to need a trillion dollar bailout eventually, is what he seems to be saying, and he's right.  

 
rockaction said:
I thought the same thing about the anecdotes. I didn't think it was short on actual facts and policy. Thought it was dense. 

The point about remedies was that there were none. It's a Ponzi scheme, essentially. That's why it's a swindle, SD. 

But your comment is well-taken. If you were looking for remedies, they're just aren't any. He's likening it to the bank debacle. Somebody is going to need a trillion dollar bailout eventually, is what he seems to be saying, and he's right.  
I don't think the analogy holds for a few reasons.  One is the relative size of the mortgage market vs the student loan market.  A trillion dollar bailout on a $1.5T portfolio would just be massive losses.  Considering the difficulty in discharging these in bankruptcy (whether or not that is good policy) would be massive.  I think something like 10-15% are in default or 90 days delinquent.  Further more, the firms that hold these are not very well connected into the rest of the system....meaning the type of dangerous contagion we saw to depository institutions wouldn't be there.

Any time you become over indebted, these things can spiral quickly.  No doubt when that is unfortunate

I do think most people miss an important part of what is happening with higher education.  We are seeing severe evidence of increased demand:  higher tuition, higher student loan debt,  and a proliferation of crappy, for-profit schools.  People want college degrees.  Think they need those degrees and stretch themselves to make it happen. 

The liberal solution seems to be making college more affordable through something like free tuition or expanded pell grants.  That will make the demand problem about the same to slightly worse, even if it fixes the student loan piece (for new issuance at least).  I read a lot of libertarians talking about distance/online education and the like.  I think those can have powerful impacts, but not necessarily on the college/funding question.  It is hard to get around the signal of a degree and accreditation. 

One idea I like is to build more colleges.  But you don't here a lot of that suggested, except by Noah Smith.  That actually increases the supply, I think that is a needed piece.

 
Or we could stop requiring people to go $150,000 in debt to subsidize human resource offices.  
I was about to supply a response, but it crosses my mind you could either mean that colleges/universities are wasting money or that corporations are not effectively selecting for the talent they think they are by requiring a college degree.  A bit of truth in each, but I'm not sure your angle.

And I don't mean bit to belittle it, just curious which because they have different policy implications

 
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I was about to supply a response, but it crosses my mind you could either mean that colleges/universities are wasting money or that corporations are not effectively selecting for the talent they think they are by requiring a college degree.  A bit of truth in each, but I'm not sure your angle.

And I don't mean bit to belittle it, just curious which because they have different policy implications
Thanks for the thoughtful response. Seriously. 

I was saying that corporations are not effectively selecting for talent. I think that licensing requirements and HR requirements are a real drag on our economy, which is tertiary and based in communication, at which most people are effective. I think it puts a lot of good people who otherwise aren't suited for school in debt. 

It used to be that school was a luxury; it requires a different skill set to work in the world. It's weird that a college degree means so much to so many firms, entities, etc.  

 
Yeah, I think the demand is irrational (and driven in part by subsidized loans).  Any educational system that requires the vast majority of people to pay for the skills/experience needed to guarantee a job sufficient to support their family is a failed educational system.  

I don't think the solution is loan forgiveness (a policy that would be a boon to people like me with fairly high salary jobs and big student loan debt much more than for people struggling to make ends meet).  I think the solution is public financing of whatever skills we need to be competitive.  If that means up to the associate's degree level, then fine.  But more fundamentally, I think it's another argument for an expansion of the social safety net.  Because when we tie so much of a family's basic welfare to the jobs they hold, then we create households that are incredibly susceptible to market fluctuations and inefficiencies in business (such as businesses hiring based on degrees that don't better prepare workers).

 
I think the solution is public financing of whatever skills we need to be competitive.  If that means up to the associate's degree level, then fine.  But more fundamentally, I think it's another argument for an expansion of the social safety net.
I'd much rather see "public" financing in the form of a Basic Income Guarantee that can be spent on anything, not just education, so that education isn't shielded from market forces that might otherwise keep tuition in check.

As things stand now, it's easy to step back and view things from the outside and conclude that there's too much administrative bloat, too much competition for students based on fancy student centers and plush on-campus housing rather than on price, and so on, but I don't think anyone with the power to fix things from within the system has the right incentives to do so. It might take exogenous forces, like competition from online universities, to set things back on the right path. But there's a lot that has to change first, including public attitudes that put more value on education-as-signaling than on education-as-learning.

 
I'd much rather see "public" financing in the form of a Basic Income Guarantee that can be spent on anything, not just education, so that education isn't shielded from market forces that might otherwise keep tuition in check.

As things stand now, it's easy to step back and view things from the outside and conclude that there's too much administrative bloat, too much competition for students based on fancy student centers and plush on-campus housing rather than on price, and so on, but I don't think anyone with the power to fix things from within the system has the right incentives to do so. It might take exogenous forces, like competition from online universities, to set things back on the right path. But there's a lot that has to change first, including public attitudes that put more value on education-as-signaling than on education-as-learning.
This all seems correct to me.  

 
Ilov80s said:
I have already posted this in 2 threads, why not another since it fits in here (probably was the correct spot for it)

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/18/business/student-loans-licenses.html
Kind of a dumb article. The woman that was the centerpiece of injustice for that story took ten years off of work to have 6 kids and surprisingly couldnt keep up paying on her student loans. Two years after going back to work she had to setup a payment plan or risk losing her license. She is making the payments. If she didnt make the payments taxpayers would be on the hook for them. Whats the issue here? 

 
Thanks for the thoughtful response. Seriously. 

I was saying that corporations are not effectively selecting for talent. I think that licensing requirements and HR requirements are a real drag on our economy, which is tertiary and based in communication, at which most people are effective. I think it puts a lot of good people who otherwise aren't suited for school in debt. 

It used to be that school was a luxury; it requires a different skill set to work in the world. It's weird that a college degree means so much to so many firms, entities, etc.  
Nowhere better than Action Whimsy for this type of stuff. :thumbup:

I find it a hard question of what to do that makes corporations realize who wasteful they are.  Licensing matters, for sure.  I work for a very large, very wasteful company where common sense matters more than anything.  But these companies select for conformity and obedience over anything else.  How does the state change their minds about it?  Difficult/

 
Kind of a dumb article. The woman that was the centerpiece of injustice for that story took ten years off of work to have 6 kids and surprisingly couldnt keep up paying on her student loans. Two years after going back to work she had to setup a payment plan or risk losing her license. She is making the payments. If she didnt make the payments taxpayers would be on the hook for them. Whats the issue here? 
Ms. Otto borrowed money to become a nurse. Then she went through a really bad epileptic spell that prevented her from working, No job meant no paying the student loans. She then had her nursing license suspended. It would cost her $1500 to get get the license back but she can't afford it because she is not allowed to work in her profession. In the last 5 years, at least 5000 people in Tenneessee have lost their professional licenses. I get the idea that the money was borrowed from us and should be repaid. I am all for it and I know there are liens, hits to credit scores etc. that come with default. I don't understand the idea of taking away their means for making a living or transporting themself to work. How do we expect to ever get paid back? I would support something similar to child support where the money is automatically withheld from a paycheck long before I ever thought to support taking away their professional license or drivers license. 

 
Ms. Otto borrowed money to become a nurse. Then she went through a really bad epileptic spell that prevented her from working, No job meant no paying the student loans. She then had her nursing license suspended. It would cost her $1500 to get get the license back but she can't afford it because she is not allowed to work in her profession. In the last 5 years, at least 5000 people in Tenneessee have lost their professional licenses. I get the idea that the money was borrowed from us and should be repaid. I am all for it and I know there are liens, hits to credit scores etc. that come with default. I don't understand the idea of taking away their means for making a living or transporting themself to work. How do we expect to ever get paid back? I would support something similar to child support where the money is automatically withheld from a paycheck long before I ever thought to support taking away their professional license or drivers license. 
Only south dakota does the drivers licenses. 

Shannon Otto is also not who they should have hung their hat on. That article is terrible. Years of school? How about one year. She is an LPN in tennessee. She got her license when she was 18. She still hadnt paid off that loan when she was 32 and hadn't had seizures yet? Shannon Otto who is photographed in her nashville home that has a violin and guitar in the photo with her and what appears to be a pretty nice home. Shannon Otto who may have her license back and it looks like the times used info from a two year old article on her by the nashville paper. There are quite a few articles on this over the last two years and that text shows up pretty much identical. There is a photon on the times with a caption that mentions she got her license back. 

And i am pretty sure that 5000 figure still counts the people that get them back. 

This kind if stuff is usually very effective. So while you hear all the sob stories, they almost always come up with the dough. Which clearly they weren't before.

 
Only south dakota does the drivers licenses. 
It says Iowa does as well. Not sure if they exercise that power but the article implies they could. 

Shannon Otto is also not who they should have hung their hat on. That article is terrible. Years of school? How about one year. She is an LPN in tennessee. She got her license when she was 18. She still hadnt paid off that loan when she was 32 and hadn't had seizures yet?
Where does it say that? I didn't see that information on her.

Shannon Otto who is photographed in her nashville home that has a violin and guitar in the photo with her and what appears to be a pretty nice home. Shannon Otto who may have her license back and it looks like the times used info from a two year old article on her by the nashville paper. There are quite a few articles on this over the last two years and that text shows up pretty much identical. There is a photon on the times with a caption that mentions she got her license back. 

And i am pretty sure that 5000 figure still counts the people that get them back. 

This kind if stuff is usually very effective. So while you hear all the sob stories, they almost always come up with the dough. Which clearly they weren't before.
As for the photo, I won't judge much from that. It could be her mom's house or a friend's house or something. It doesn't look particularly nice or not nice. I don't see where the Nashville article was or the photo saying she got her licsense back. Maybe the print article is signficantly different?

 
It says Iowa does as well. Not sure if they exercise that power but the article implies they could. 

Where does it say that? I didn't see that information on her.

As for the photo, I won't judge much from that. It could be her mom's house or a friend's house or something. It doesn't look particularly nice or not nice. I don't see where the Nashville article was or the photo saying she got her licsense back. Maybe the print article is signficantly different?
Iowa hasn't revoked a license for anything in 5 years for debt.

The years of school and getting her license at 18 is in the article. The type of license she has is listed on the letter she got, which is a form publication with all of the licenses in the state that were suspended. It is here.

She is in her house. Caption at top

According to this which ranks the top 5 LPN programs near Nashville they range in cost from 3100 to 6067. She is 39 now. So how much do you think it cost 21 years ago? And she still owed 1500 on it in 2015?   

I hate articles like this. They know exactly what they are doing by picking these little snippets and trying to paint this horror story. they refer to it as her dream job, paint it as years of school. Most people would make the obvious assumption after reading years of school that she is a registered nurse and picture this astronomical amount. 

I agree with you about the drivers license side of this. I think that is silly in a place like south dakota that has pretty much zero public transit and I think would likely not create the sense of urgency to pay back and instead would just lead to uninsured drivers on the roads. 

I don't want to pay for Shannon or Debra's terrible life choices so if this gets the job done, I support it. Based on the fact that these examples took years and years to actually get suspended(Debra was only suspended on accident for a week only and had been back to work for two years when it happened) I think you get a lot of notice and heads up and you have the ability to come up with payment plans. 

In the article you linked it gave one example with firm numbers of how quickly and effectively this works. In louisiana they issued a notice to 87 nurses that had reached the level of suspension time. They issued a notice on 9/14/16 and within a few months 84 of them had paid their debts. 

 
Iowa hasn't revoked a license for anything in 5 years for debt.

The years of school and getting her license at 18 is in the article. The type of license she has is listed on the letter she got, which is a form publication with all of the licenses in the state that were suspended. It is here.

She is in her house. Caption at top

According to this which ranks the top 5 LPN programs near Nashville they range in cost from 3100 to 6067. She is 39 now. So how much do you think it cost 21 years ago? And she still owed 1500 on it in 2015?   

I hate articles like this. They know exactly what they are doing by picking these little snippets and trying to paint this horror story. they refer to it as her dream job, paint it as years of school. Most people would make the obvious assumption after reading years of school that she is a registered nurse and picture this astronomical amount. 

I agree with you about the drivers license side of this. I think that is silly in a place like south dakota that has pretty much zero public transit and I think would likely not create the sense of urgency to pay back and instead would just lead to uninsured drivers on the roads. 

I don't want to pay for Shannon or Debra's terrible life choices so if this gets the job done, I support it. Based on the fact that these examples took years and years to actually get suspended(Debra was only suspended on accident for a week only and had been back to work for two years when it happened) I think you get a lot of notice and heads up and you have the ability to come up with payment plans. 

In the article you linked it gave one example with firm numbers of how quickly and effectively this works. In louisiana they issued a notice to 87 nurses that had reached the level of suspension time. They issued a notice on 9/14/16 and within a few months 84 of them had paid their debts. 
I figured out the problem. You are not reading the same article as me. I was reading the NYTimes article I posted. You are reading The Anchorage Daily News.

 
I figured out the problem. You are not reading the same article as me. I was reading the NYTimes article I posted. You are reading The Anchorage Daily News.
I read like 6 articles that were almost identical, just different bits and pieces left out. Sorry if I crossed a few, but the info I posted was factually correct. 

Here is where it said she got her license at age 18 it appears to be the earliest story dated back in 2015. 

Shannon Otto graduated from nursing school when she was 18, but five years ago at the age of 32 she started having seizures and was diagnosed with epilepsy.

 
I read like 6 articles that were almost identical, just different bits and pieces left out. Sorry if I crossed a few, but the info I posted was factually correct. 

Here is where it said she got her license at age 18 it appears to be the earliest story dated back in 2015. 
Oh yeah, I believe you. I was just puzzled where all these details were coming from. I agree with you that this seems like a case of exaggerated journalism. I still disagree with laws and see how they could leave open room for abuse. 

 
The press release from DOJ doesn’t admit what you say it admits.  It just apologizes for slow processing.  
Ah, I see. Thanks for pointing that out via the press release.

That said, the slow processing is the point, though, isn't it? That we will deny your status until an important political event has passed seems like time-shifting only, rather than a substantive point. 

Another reason executive agencies need more accountability.  

 
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rockaction said:
Ah, I see. Thanks for pointing that out via the press release.

That said, the slow processing is the point, though, isn't it? That we will deny your status until an important political event has passed seems like time-shifting only, rather than a substantive point. 

Another reason executive agencies need more accountability.  
501(c)(4) organizations can only engage in political activity as a secondary activity to their stated purpose.  It makes some sense to give extra scrutiny to organizations that name themselves after political or lobbying activities when determining whether or not to grant exempt status - and if the "important political event" is their actual purpose, that's a problem.

 
@rockaction - I was generally virulently against Obama's approach and policies vis a vis Israel, but I believe a title correction is in order, here.

 
@rockaction - I was generally virulently against Obama's approach and policies vis a vis Israel, but I believe a title correction is in order, here.
Sure thing. I don't want to drive a false narrative. I think it's suspect, but will accommodate those among us that I consider perfectly reasonable, like you, Henry, and fatguy.  

 

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