I figure I'll do this type of segment occassionally. I'm calling it "You know what really grinds my gears" after a similar thing Peter Griffin did on Family Guy a while back. Why? Not because I'm fond of Family Guy, more because "Sarah gets on her self-righteous soapbox" tends to scare away readers. So here goes.
What's particularly grinding my gears at 5 minutes to midnight on the Sunday after Thanksgiving? Something that's been on my mind, something I've noticed for a good while now. Without fail, every Sunday/Monday, a good many people on my little Facebook feed make some complaining commentary about how much it sucks that it's Monday and they have to go to work.
You know what I have to say to the people that complain about having to go to work on Monday?
Shut up!
This country sat down and ate turkey in remembrance of Thanksgiving, which should be a day of giving thanks and remembering just how far God has brought us. Instead, some choose to whine about having to go to work on Monday.
Hi, I'm 35 weeks pregnant. I have a Master's degree and have been unable to find a job since graduating over the summer. I am dying to have a job. Preferrably one in my field, but just about any job I'm physically capable of at this point would be nice. I'm applying for jobs I was overqualified for stepping out of high school, let alone qualified for now. I've been told I can pretty much forget it until after our son has been born and I have recovered from delivery.
Do you have any idea how much I would LOVE to have a job to go to on Monday, even with the weight, aches, pains, and other symptoms of late pregnancy? Do you have any idea what it feels like to see people complaining about having something you've been dying to get for the past months, because it's inconvenient for them to interrupt their two days of leisure and errand running to be productive and earn a living?
I have a lot to be thankful for this year. Do I want a job? Yes, it's at the top of my list right now. But I'm thankful that at least I don't have to worry about dealing with taking off to have a baby and what not. There is some good in it. I'm not complaining about the situation, just dealing with the reality of it. Everyone has their laundry list of problems and irritations they have to deal with in their lives. I have mine, but I try to be thankful for the things that God has given us, for the things I don't have to deal with.
Point is, everyone has their problems, but my goodness, do we have to complain about trivial things like being a productive member of society on a Monday morning on facebook, when there are others who would love to have that particular blessing to complain about?
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Well, your blog only lets me do so many characters at a time, so I will break them up a bit.
ReplyDelete1) Agreed. I was always taught to budget based on how much money you have, not how much money you expect to get…and even more, not how much money you expect to get 10 years from now. In regards to the stimulus bill, its execution was largely flawed, but the concept was sound and its reason was necessary. Our economy is built on faith and trust. We invest in corporations because we have faith that they will return a profit. Banks loan people and businesses money because they trust they will be repaid (and in the end, make a profit). While the economy was spiraling out of control at the beginning of the economic crisis, no one had faith or trust in anything. Small businesses couldn’t open because they couldn’t get startup capital both because the banks didn’t have money because no one was investing in them because they didn’t have any money because they couldn’t get money off of their investments and because they didn’t trust the banks to make smart loans and they couldn’t get startup capital because no one had faith they would succeed because no one had money to spend at these companies, and so on and so on. Someone or something had to step in and say things were going to be ok and you had to back it up with the financial backing of something that people knew was going to have money regardless. That left Microsoft, Oprah and the Government as the only options, and I didn’t see Microsoft and Oprah stepping up.
2) Market based healthcare sounds great, but if we did, the only people who would have healthcare are the rich. Why would a corporation insure someone that is a high risk? The only way to mitigate their risk is to have premiums out the ass. This is why the premiums for stuntmen are so high, but they can pay it because they make it back. What about a teacher with cancer. They have a high risk to the insurer, but at the same time, they can’t afford a high premium. The corporation has no incentive or logical market based reason to provide health care to that person. Look at how car insurance works. If you have a history of speeding tickets or are 16 years old, you have much lower premiums because you are a lower risk. If you have a shit ton of tickets and drive a car that historically is more susceptible to theft, you have a high ass premium. Now, the difference is that if you can’t get car insurance, all you lose is your ability to drive (unless you pay the fee for not having insurance). If you can’t get health insurance, you lose your life (I am taking it to the extreme, but what would you do if there wasn’t public healthcare? Have Nathan in tub at home with a midwife? Yes, it works, but is that what we want to settle for. I will completely agree that people abuse welfare and Medicaid. Then again, there are people like you who use it as a crutch during a difficult time and are working towards a point where you no longer need that crutch. You and many people like you are an argument for reform of the system with greater oversight to ensure people aren’t abusing the system, not an argument for elimination of the system, because we can see that some people, even if there was no crutch in place would rely on something (friends, family, philanthropists) to avoid doing work.
3) “Cap and Trade” is a market based (though not completely market driven) environmental solution. Again, what is the market driven incentive for not polluting? Do you make money by not polluting? Do you gain costumers by not polluting? Not when the bottom line say that it costs X to install scrubbers on this smoke stack and it costs X to transport this runoff to a disposal site when it costs nothing to have my smokestack just pump CO2 in the air and it costs nothing to maintain the pipe that runs Mercury in to the river. “Cap and Trade” provides a market based financial incentive for corporations to pollute less. They can pollute somewhat less (to stay under the cap) and not pay a little to make some modifications or they can pay a lot and make modifications to stay way under the cap, but then make the money back by selling their excess cap room. This is no different than someone buying an old 3 bedroom house, fixing it up and renting it out to 3 students and making money off if it. Does it go far enough? Not in my opinion, but I think it’s a good step in market based environmental regulation.
ReplyDelete4) I work for several Unions, so I am obviously greatly biased in this area so I will just PASS.
5) See my previous commentaries on immigration reform on Facebook.
6) I don’t think we should follow the military recommendations. I am sick of both Iraq and Afghanistan. Send the whole fucking Armed Forces over there, sweep the countries clean and be over with it already. “Walk softly, but carry a big stick, and when you use it, beat the shit out them until there are bleeding from orifices that you have just created when you threw the stick straight threw their chest.”
7) This is the “Walk Softly” part. They are entitled to their sovereignty until the fuck with us. Then they get the rest of #6
8) See my previous commentaries on gay marriage on Facebook.
9) See, now I think they just ran of things but they need to make it to 10 cus really, this is just part of #10. Either that, or it’s a veiled pro-life statement, but some poll said that they shouldn’t keep marketing it like that, and in that case, I have long held that the government should have no role in it. It’s a horrible decision for anyone to have to make and I couldn’t be with a woman who wanted to take that course with a child of mine, but if anyone else in my life felt the need to make the choice, then it’s their prerogative and I will urge them not to, but nevertheless support them. As for funding, it’s a medical procedure and if the government is going to fund medical procedures then they need to fund all of them. As for rationing, how is this any different from what we have now? If I wanted to go to the doctor and get lypo, my insurance probably wouldn’t cover most of it as it isn’t medically necessary. If I had a disease that no other regular treatment has been able to cure, but there are experimental treatments, the insurance company likely wouldn’t cover them. All of this is rationing. I would prefer the government ration than a corporation because at least with the government, there are more recourses for rectifying the situation, via lobbying for policy changes, loopholes and just public awareness to guilt a Congressman to make a change (or donating to his campaign). How do u get a corporation to change? Public awareness sometimes works, but most of the time is a class-action law suit, in which case you will probably be dead before the case goes through.
10) Everyone shouldn’t have guns. Most people should have guns. Felons shouldn’t have guns. People with a history of mental instability shouldn’t have guns. Pro football and basketball players shouldn’t have guns. Nichols shouldn’t have a gun. Everyone else is fine.