Gautam Mukunda wrote: > --- Robert Seeberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > wrote: > >> Gautam Mukunda wrote: >> >>> I do love the trumping of CostCo, though. It >>> kind of proves my point. CostCo has the wealthiest >>> demographics of any of the large discount chains, by a >>> huge amount. CostCo is basically the rich man's >>> WalMart. So of course limousine liberals like it - >>> they shop at CostCo. It's those icky poor people who >>> shop at WalMart. >> >> And a rich republican would /never/ shop at CostCo >> because they like >> to shop with poor icky people. > > No, but they wouldn't try to _screw over_ those poor > people by harming WalMart, a vastly different scale of > things.
Maybe I missed something. Can you give an example for "harming WalMart", besides somply talking bad about the company? (It might have been shown and I forgot or missed it.) >> >> >>> I actually think this may be another >>> reason the >> >>> chattering classes >> >> <Blatant uneccessary insult> > > ??? "Chattering classes" is a fairly well known > phrase. Are you speaking of some group specifically? I got the idea you were slamming liberals specifically with that. >> >>> don't like it, actually, >>> because it degrades the value of the educational >>> credentials that they tend to confuse with moral >>> worth. >> >> I think you are arguing that the class warfare >> people keep telling me >> doesn't exist actually does exist. > > Class warfare? I don't know about that. Do the rich > often try to screw the poor over? Sure. It's just > not the way that liberal elites want us to believe. > It's most often by restricting economic activity that > would help the poor because it offends their > sensibilities. I read that as "paying a decent wage". Correct me if I'm wrong. > It's about derogatory comments about > NASCAR or trailer parks. I too found that personally offensive as well as the talk about "The South" running the government. I don't agree with that sentiment at all. > This is perhaps the single > best argument for limiting the power of the > government. The rich are far more able than the poor > to use the government to their advantage. A limited > government has much less power to be used by the rich > against the poor. I see the current administration as being squarely in the corporist corner. Now, I recognise your rhetoric to be squarely in the tradition of conservatism. But I see zero evidence that the current admin shares your philosophy. I think this is why you and John are catching so much heat, especially lately. (IOW, it is not just Brin you have had to argue with.) >> >> >>> WalMart does more to get the poor and lower >>> middle class in this country cheap (and high quality) >>> food, clothing, and basic necessities than every >>> charitable organization combined, and the growth of >>> WalMart has done more for the well-being of the poor >>> in America than any economic program of my lifetime. >> >> I shop at WalMart. But saving a few cents here and >> there and the >> occasional dollar is not in any way equivilent to >> having an income or >> having your income supplimented. >> The above statement is ridiculous in the extreme. > > No, it's not. It's Economics 101. WalMart has given > many of the poor and uneducated and illegal aliens >jobs that they could > never have gotten without it. This is a huge benefit > to the poor. According to people I know who work at WalMart, they are not allowed to work more than 32 hours a week. This is done so that WalMart will not have to provide them with insurance or other benefits. This is a nationwide policy. To my way of thinking, this provides WalMart with a vast underpaid workforce and gives them an unfair advantage in the market. > It's allowed enormous numbers of the > poor - many of whom _don't work_ at WalMart - access > to food and clothing that fits within their budget. True. WalMart is mostly beneficial to people who do not work there. > There are two ways to help the poor. One is to give > them more money. The second is to make what they need > cheaper. WalMart does the second better than any > other company in history. It has the thinnest profit > margins of any major retailer (IIRC). It forces its > suppliers to become more efficient - and then passes > those savings on to the consumer instead of pocketing > the difference. Also true, and it has the secondary effect of bringing prices down in other stores as the competition heats up. I can see this happening at several types of retailer. > The few cents you save from shopping > at WalMart might not make much of a difference. Try > raising a family of four on $18,000 a year (the > disgracefully low national poverty line) and see if > your attitude changes a bit. You may have forgotten that I am the oldest of 7 children who's father died before I finished high school. I've *been* poor, both with my family and on my own. I've been out of work and broke. I've had to move in with my Mom and had to move out again when other family members with children needed her help more. I've slept in my car with no place to go. I have lived in what passes for a ghetto in Houston. Tell me something I don't know. <G> > >>> This, of course, means it's inevitable that it's >>> attacked by self-proclaimed advocates of the poor. >>> But, as Caitlin Flanagan brilliantly commented in a >>> discussion on Slate on this topic, those advocates may >>> complain about it, but when she talks to _actual poor >>> people_, "they love WalMart". Because, of course, it >>> gets them what they need at prices that they can >>> afford and, >> >> People also love WalMart because they are huge, and >> you can get almost >> anything you need. It is handy for >> one-stop-shopping. > > Yeah, but that's a lot more important when you're rich > than when you're poor (time value of money). Right, especially when WalMart builds their stores closer to affluence than to poverty. It may be different elsewhere, but here WalMart is a strictly outside-the-loop establishment. > >>> when you get down to it, that's the real >>> problem that people have with it. >>> It replaces all >>> those charming small stores that were only too >>> expensive for the poor to use. >> >> People are always nostalgic for the things that >> were. I remember the >> neighborhood drugstore/5&dime/malt shop. When I was >> a kid I would go >> there to hang out and read comic books, buy candy or >> milkshakes, and >> just generally hang out. I knew the owners and the >> employees well and >> they knew me just as they knew everyone in the hood. >> It was a safe place to spend part of a summer day or >> to visit after >> school. >> >> Think you can ascribe some sort of evil liberal >> agenda to my >> nostalgia? > > No. But your antipathy to WalMart that is driven by Halt! Hold it right there! I shop WalMart all the time. I am not what you would call an Anti-WalMart person actually. But I try to look at it realisticly. I think you are painting WalMart with slightly rosier colors than they deserve. > that nostalgia would, if it were enacted in > legislation, harm the poor more than almost any other > likely legislative change (the only thing that could > even come close is the onset of protectionism). I'm pretty sure this is true. > Nostalgia is something you can afford when you're > rich. Having been poor and having known many many people who were worse off than me, I can tell you with certainty that nostalgia is universal and even the poorest of people miss the corner store or market and the objects of their youth. I think I know what you mean though. Nostalgia is something only people with some degree of affluence (including the middle class of course) can afford to buy or pursue. That I would agree with. >When you're poor, you're worried about feeding > your family. Again, class issues drive politics and, > again, it's the (relatively) wealthy gaining a small > benefit for them (assuaging their nostalgia) on the > backs of the poor, whose food and clothing they make > more expensive. Alternately, the movement of manufacturing jobs out of the country while jobs-for-the-educated/trained have been created (over the last 3 decades) has virtually guaranteed the continuation of an impovershed class. I understand that 100% employment has its own set of problems, but I have to wonder if the "patriots" running the nations businesses give even the slightest care for the issues you and I are discussing. Or is it that these issues are too distant for them to comprehend on a personal level. > An evil liberal agenda? I don't know > about evil. I thank you for that, as one American to another. > But a selfish one, driven by snobbery and > economic ignorance? Absolutely. Economic ignorance will vary by individual. But snobbery? Jeez, the liberal set is mostly blue collar and poor by the numbers. (But then, so is the conservative set.) >> >> >>> But it didn't bother >>> those elites, so what does that matter? >> >> The problem with these kinds of top-down-view >> arguments is that they >> are /all/ elitist. >> You totally miss the point by ascribing these views >> only to the >> affluent liberals when the same views are held by >> affluent >> conservatives, middle class *and* the poor. > > The conservatives have those views, but they don't > operationalize them to _harm_ the poor. No, they just don't pay them enough in the first place. <G> >So what their > particular beliefs are is no skin off my nose. As for > the middle class and poor? If they held those > views...they wouldn't shop at WalMart. Some don't. I know that unions tend to be anti-globalist. (That's protectionist in nature) >> >> One can love shopping at WalMart and can still decry >> the loss of the >> corner/storefront shop at the same time. > > Yes, but when you try and retard WalMart because of > that loss, then you're saying that the expensive goods > that you want are more important than helping the poor > and lower middle class get what they need. If you > feel that way, then feel that way, but don't pretend > it's some sort of moral principle on behalf of the > poor. Hmmm.....Not sure what you are painting *me* as here. >> >> There is no binary choice involved. > > No, there really is. Well.....I disagree. I figure it is a conservative penchant for binary thinking to think that I cannot like shopping at WalMart *and* at my corner store, or that even poor people might feel similarly I often have mixed feelings about various aspects of various issues, but I don't see that as a sign of inconsistancy, just that nothing in life fullfils my expectations and desires 100%. > >> xponent >> Lets See What He Snips Maru >> rob > > Not a word. Except the Brin-L sig, I think. And I appreciate that! I've noticed people (not just you) lately snipping parts of messages that seemed to me to be important rebuttals. This has lead to drastic detours within some threads without resolution of previous points. I sit wondering sometimes if a person is conceeding a point or just being intellectually dishonest. I see no dishonor in saying "I'm gonna think about this a while" or "I'll get back to this later". So you do me honor by considering what I say to you point by point. I thank you for that. xponent Mondo Political Maru rob _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
