Steven Colbert to Congress

[Kay/NC]

It becomes less and less a matter of what individual politicians say ro think anymore, and a greater concern what the media chooses to push to the fore.  Colbert's mix of demographics in terms of audience is a lot of younger males in particular...at least from the people I know, they are the ones who watch him.  He and the US military have a tight relationship from what I observe, and he may inlfluence more of our fighting forces than you or I coud imagine, for example. 

He hosts a lot of extremely bright and often controversial guests, and I ended up reading more due to the interviews he held on subjects of economics and social issues  - and all social issues have elements of economics and vice versa than we'd like to admit - than I realized.   (I miss being able to watch him regularly these days, but I needed to focus my mind elsewhere for a few months, to get a grip on nursign school and a total lifestyle change involved with that.)

Colbert is adept at making us watch where the money goes.  It is a lesson I learned a long, llong time ago...follow the money.  People can give lip service to education, for example, but when a state starts to raid the lottery money it had substituted for actual general fund money to schools, diverting  it to roads and other public works, that tells me that the lobbyists for construction companies  are far more effective at funding campaigns than are Little Suzy and Johnny.  Heck, they can't even vote yet!

I have been a "grassroots person" visiting and working the room in the state legislature, and my main impression was that the world is being ruled by people in suits, which for some reason at that point in time truly troubled me. 

My other position on a democratic process is that anyone who is elected to act on our behalf in the process of making a bill become a law ought to have to pass a quiz on the content and effect of it, and every amendment to it, and get at least a D, in order to be eligible to vote.   

[wt510151]

It is not always in the fields that undocumented workers exist. Many illegal immigrants have worked as household help. Some of those employers now don't have enough money to justify a maid or nanny today.

As for justice enforcers, the police and federal authorities don't always cooperate. That is why a petittion was approved in Fremont to prohibit employers and landlords from engaging with undocumented workers.

[nwobcw]

Fremont in what state?

[smokeyjay]

The challenge as you mention is the influence of the legislator's vote, via campaign contributuions, or money.  Short of a radical revolution or revolt by the voters, the only way to combat influence is to combine forces with other groups and amass greater influence than those who oppose our agenda. 

This is what angers me to no end, that grassroots ag groups are so independent minded that they are more willing to shoot themselves in the foot and kill off their allies than band together to fight a common enemy.  I've seen this happen many times., the latest one ocurring during the climate change debate.

Yes, legislators should pass a test to see if they know what's in the bill.  A case in point; nobody even read the financial regulatory reform bill, 2700 pages of legaleze that hid tons of pork for Democratic programs.  Only now have legislators begun to realize what is in it.

[wt510151]

Nebraska. Employers couldn't employ them and landlords couldn't rent to them. I don't think it is being enforced while the Arizona lawsuit is going.

[k-289]

Kay---never heard of RR employ robbing a bank and murdering 5 innocent people---this is what happened here ---when the goody $$$$ ran out 3 years later Tyson closed the plant----cheap is just what it is--a lot of short term thinking

[kraft-t]

I'll tell you how that turned out.  Meryl Streep actress was concerned about alar being present in apple juice that is consumed by the public. I beleive the government ruling disclosed that the presence of alar produce very little risk.

As a side though the government agency also concluded that there is no or very little nutricianal value in  apple juice. Did the apople growers win? I'm not sure.

[wt510151]

I don't have cable to watch the entire testimony so didn't really know much but for the snippets the news allowed until today on Market to Market. "Take our Jobs" is an eye-opener that many of us don't realize is slowing occurring because we are so close to the problem. How many of us farmers would do these jobs? Do you think unemployed city folks would on a long-term basis? The average age of farmers is getting closer to Social Security age every year. More farm youth are going to jobs that don't require the physical labor many of us did when at that age. Equipment and employees are acquired to keep us from doing the hard work ourselves, to make us more efficient with our time, money, and energy. Rep. King (IA) said it was easy to get people to do hard work given the right wages and markets. Do you think you would have the resources to hire out of work citizens to do the hand work necessary for some crops and livestock in your area? Do you believe that the lack of physical work ethic or job regulations is partially to blame for the surge of obesity in this country? What would be your suggestions to the politicains who dictate many of practices?

[kraft-t]

Hiring out of work employees should not be the objective. That indicates that you think the unemployed should be forced to take your offer. I think many beleive that.

I think a better oibjective would be to hire a good employee at a competitive price. That's what real businesses do. Compete in the market place for the most competent help. Often that individual will already have a job you you hope to entice him by a better offer.

As far as unemployent benefits are concerned they have been paid for by workers thriugh their employers. Many consider unemployment benefits as welfare benefits. Not quite so.

I'm not trying tp put words in your mouth because I don'rt even know what your stance is. But many think unemployed should be compelled to work for substandard wages. I do not.

[Kay/NC]

The truth is, agriculture in this country - if not worldwide - has alwasy been accomplushed by the disenfranchised.  We started with indentured servants at Jamestown, then added slaves in 1619 (at least the males of African descent got to vote before the women, who arrived the same year.)

I knew many families who had a large number of children...for example, my FIL was one of thirteen offspring, and farm broods were often that large or larger.  Tenant farming and sharecropping were a feature of Southern plantations and farms for generations after the Late Unpleasantness. 

When WWII took many poor boys off, never to return to farming, chemicals and machinery took over for a lot of hand labor.  We still functioned on an agrarian calendar for school years, until Kings Dominion out-lobbied ag in VA.  I was one of the few kids in my generation who worked at farming all summer and every weekend, in crops, delivering eggs to stores, helping in the farrowing house, etc.

Having done that until I was eighteen, escaping the scut chores by way of a college education and then returning to farming fulltime - mostly because I was better suited to it than I was to being stuck indoors all day - I can say that I sincerely doubt that we as a nation can (Are willing to?)afford a food supply that actually pays its workers a living wage in most cases.  There are too many competitors for our money...entertainment, fashion, electronics, etc. 

We pay teachers and other professionals barely survival wages - much less a return on the investment they've had to make in training -  for barely middle class standards in most places as it stands now.  If that is the  best we are willing to do for people with master's degrees, how much do you really expect someone to value a guy picking strawberries or packing sweet corn?