I follow a number of libertarian and pro-free-market sites and pages on social media, and I sometimes amuse myself by reading the comments under posts promoting capitalist ideas.
Sound advice. It is exhausting, however, pulling the weeds. The arguments aren't the least bit interesting or novel - it's the same weed as last week. And at a point, you realize you're fighting people who're PAID to troll the nonsense. The recurring common theme right now in all their posts is "there's no proof of fraud" anywhere in all this welfare spending. In our state, SNAP rolls dropped 50,000 in two months (in a state of just 5 million that's a lot) - and the paid activists are screaming about "hunger" - and yet, there's nobody legitimately claiming THEY are going hungry. Which is unsurprising - the "new standards" require only that you be a live person, you show proof that you live in the state, that you're provably below a certain income level and that you worked or volunteered 5 hours PER WEEK (or are elderly or permanently disabled). I don't doubt the vast majority of those 50,000 (and counting!) were simply fraudsters who couldn't prove they were even real people.
The "comments" section, in general, tends to be a worthless cesspool of garbage, best avoided. (And I say that as I post to a comments section.) I've always said that the good thing about the internet is that anyone can say anything. The bad thing about the internet is that anyone can say anything.
That's the truism in open and unmoderated comments sections. Closed groups and places where moderators are active tend to have a far better signal-to-noise ratio.
The NR comment sections at their magazine site are replete with trolls. I rarely post there anymore. Their NRPLUS closed group has a far better signal-to-noise ratio helped by the fact that you can block others who cross the line.
You'd think that reducing waste and fraud would be a bipartisan issue but apparently not. For example, the Dems should have put pressure on Walz to immediately resign considering the depth of corruption in his state. But, no.
One other observation. Given how government is so involved with business in our nation, I suspect that many confuse crony capitalism with capitalism itself.
The lack of concern makes sense if you look at it from the perspective of the class warfare that is the preference of the day. Politics is not about helping those that need help, no matter how much that message is preached. It's about hurting those they don't like. It's why the message that's endlessly hammered is "tax the billionaires," rather than "help the poor."
There are countless things that government can do to help the poor that does not involve hurting the rich, but hurting the rich satisfies their hate-lust, so that's what they focus on.
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Sound advice. It is exhausting, however, pulling the weeds. The arguments aren't the least bit interesting or novel - it's the same weed as last week. And at a point, you realize you're fighting people who're PAID to troll the nonsense. The recurring common theme right now in all their posts is "there's no proof of fraud" anywhere in all this welfare spending. In our state, SNAP rolls dropped 50,000 in two months (in a state of just 5 million that's a lot) - and the paid activists are screaming about "hunger" - and yet, there's nobody legitimately claiming THEY are going hungry. Which is unsurprising - the "new standards" require only that you be a live person, you show proof that you live in the state, that you're provably below a certain income level and that you worked or volunteered 5 hours PER WEEK (or are elderly or permanently disabled). I don't doubt the vast majority of those 50,000 (and counting!) were simply fraudsters who couldn't prove they were even real people.
The "comments" section, in general, tends to be a worthless cesspool of garbage, best avoided. (And I say that as I post to a comments section.) I've always said that the good thing about the internet is that anyone can say anything. The bad thing about the internet is that anyone can say anything.
That's the truism in open and unmoderated comments sections. Closed groups and places where moderators are active tend to have a far better signal-to-noise ratio.
The NR comment sections at their magazine site are replete with trolls. I rarely post there anymore. Their NRPLUS closed group has a far better signal-to-noise ratio helped by the fact that you can block others who cross the line.
Agreed. I think I've looked at the actual NR comments section fewer than 10x in my life.
Yes, agreed. It takes a lot for me to block someone on Facebook NRPlus, but on NRO the block/ mute option has become my friend
You'd think that reducing waste and fraud would be a bipartisan issue but apparently not. For example, the Dems should have put pressure on Walz to immediately resign considering the depth of corruption in his state. But, no.
One other observation. Given how government is so involved with business in our nation, I suspect that many confuse crony capitalism with capitalism itself.
The lack of concern makes sense if you look at it from the perspective of the class warfare that is the preference of the day. Politics is not about helping those that need help, no matter how much that message is preached. It's about hurting those they don't like. It's why the message that's endlessly hammered is "tax the billionaires," rather than "help the poor."
There are countless things that government can do to help the poor that does not involve hurting the rich, but hurting the rich satisfies their hate-lust, so that's what they focus on.