When Should Impeachment Be Used?

[Grub]

If a government mismanages its finances then none of the programs will get the money they need and all will go without. Let me give you an example. You can only spend $100 and you have three ways to spend the money and you cannot divide up these numbers, you must spend these exact amounts.
1) $35 for unemployment
2) $75 for health insurance
3) $70 for food
4) $45 for defense
5) $20 for veterans
6) $60 for orphans
7) $40 for teachers
8) $35 for police upgrades
9) $30 for new bridges
10) $40 for fire dept. pensions

Even though you want to you cannot spend more than $100, what will you spend your money on? What people try to do is say, wow a lot of those sound like good things to spend our money on and then vote for them. The problem with that is that as a nation you only have X amount of money to spend. Spending more than your allotment jeopardizes all of the other programs where you have spend your money. Programs like health care are massive. If you are not certain who is going to pay for them, on that point alone, you are naive and put your nation at risk. Financial responsibility is very important. If the US doesn't reign in its spending, not only will the US suffer badly for it, but so will the rest the the world. This will happen. The US cannot continue to spend money it does not have.

[Guy]

Actually, Grub, the US is not in trouble because of high spending, the US is in trouble because of moderate spending and really low taxes.

The US deficit, if you look at it in relation to the GDP, is actually quite low (95%, lower than almost every single Western European country). The problem is that a country with a big economy cannot incur as much debt (even in relation to the GDP) as a small economy.

[Estayland]

Mut, another thing to consider is that the opposition to this bill was bipartisan. You still had 30 or so Democrats in the House that opposed it.

[Guy]

You don't know how many politically opposed it.

But anyway, what does that matter? A majority of Americans support it.

[Estayland]

Depends on the poll you look at.

[Anime Daisuki]

Apr 4, 2010 12:04:06 GMT -5 Estayland said:

What incentive do "poor" get to better themselves if we continue to give them handouts? What is poor anyway? A regular TV instead of LCD? A 1980s car instead of newer? Basic cable instead of premium channels? The poor in the US get it a heck of a lot better than most people in other countries.

That is certainly true. They get to live in homes just like you and mine, for example, only paid for by our taxes

[Guy]

Apr 6, 2010 12:54:19 GMT -5 Anime Daisuki said:

Apr 4, 2010 12:04:06 GMT -5 Estayland said:

What incentive do "poor" get to better themselves if we continue to give them handouts? What is poor anyway? A regular TV instead of LCD? A 1980s car instead of newer? Basic cable instead of premium channels? The poor in the US get it a heck of a lot better than most people in other countries.

That is certainly true. They get to live in homes just like you and mine, for example, only paid for by our taxes

Oh God. If only that was true.

[Anime Daisuki]

I just finished two housing elements this year, one for the City of Concord and the other for the City of San Pablo, and working on another one in Central Valley. So I should know.

In California, the State sets quotas for all housing that can be developed within a city. If your city has this amount of medium to high income housing, you must have that amount of low and very low income housing, or else the city can get sued.

In most of these cases, the low and very-low income housing are NOT the type you imagine them to be. Yes, about half of those are trailer homes or run down multifamily housing built in the 60s, but a good portion are ENTIRELY NEW multifamily homes. Because of that quota I talked about, developers have to allocate a portion of their project for the low and very low-income. Typically I'd say in any new multifamily project, the split is 85 percent market rate (middle and high income) and 15 percent affordable housing. These affordable housing looks just like the homes most people have to pay $300,000 for; except they are priced at substantially low prices for the low and very-low income households.... where does the money come from to subsidized these homes? Developers still have to get paid. The subsidy don't come from heaven. They come from our tax dollars.

The fact of the matter is, if you are very poor, the government looks-out for you. Either in housing or in the case of health care. But if you are not-too-poor but not-rich-enough, like me, then you get no help at all. A large portion of the population is sandwiched like that, caught in between.

[The Candy Lane]

Apr 6, 2010 14:11:46 GMT -5 Anime Daisuki said:

I just finished two housing elements this year, one for the City of Concord and the other for the City of San Pablo, and working on another one in Central Valley. So I should know.


The fact of the matter is, if you are very poor, the government looks-out for you. Either in housing or in the case of health care. But if you are not-too-poor but not-rich-enough, like me, then you get no help at all. A large portion of the population is sandwiched like that, caught in between.

Oh the joys of middle class

Its true that the government looks out for the poor, but thats partly their job. do they go overboard, absolutely. is giving them access to basic, essential health care going overboard? I dont think so.

[Estayland]

Apr 6, 2010 13:58:09 GMT -5 Guy said:

Apr 6, 2010 12:54:19 GMT -5 Anime Daisuki said:

That is certainly true. They get to live in homes just like you and mine, for example, only paid for by our taxes

Oh God. If only that was true.

It doesn't sound as if you're not familiar with Section 8 housing.

[Anime Daisuki]

Section 8 is just one of the many housing-related grants and financial resources available to the very-low and low income groups. And keep in mind, Section 8 is just the Federal part, there are also State assistance programs. Most cities are mandated by law (in California) to have their own City programs as well. These ranges from first time homebuyer programs to weathering improvement programs to lead abatement programs... all only given out to low and very low income groups. If you earn medium income and above, you're out of luck

Apr 6, 2010 12:54:19 GMT -5 Anime Daisuki said:

That is certainly true. They get to live in homes just like you and mine, for example, only paid for by our taxes

This website is a little old, but you can see that most affordable housing looks no different than market rate housing. They are similarly designed by architects and developed by developers. The only difference is, the government pays for them and then resell them on the cheap (or rent them) to low-income households.

www.designadvisor.org

Click gallery at the top, then on the new page, click the drop down button to the left to see project examples.

Many people still have the old thinking that affordable housing automatically mean run-down housing. That's not always true.


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