02-03-2016, 07:04 PM
(01-30-2016, 03:29 AM)SickBeast Wrote: I appreciate the apology. Just for the record I would appreciate it if you would drop the name calling along with your nonsense comments about my abilities as a professional. To be frank with you, you don't even know me. I don't care how much we disagree on an issue, that's just not cool with me. I was completely kidding with you with my "insane in the brain" comments and that was inspired by the video that you posted to begin with. I'm all for some banter back and forth, I just draw the line when things get personal. I realize that you were having a bad night or something. Again, I appreciate the apology.
As for the debate, yes, you make some valid points. I don't see much point in reiterating my own viewpoint at this point. I will say, however, that I read your comments about the Detroit area and I find it heartbreaking. I'm not saying that bigger government is the answer. I will just say that there has to be a better way for you guys to do something. I do know that even in our poorest communities here in Canada, our education system is top notch. Same with our utilities (in most cases). We did have a tainted water scandal at one point but IIRC it was due to negligence and human error. It was not because they hooked up the main feed to a polluted source like what they did in Flint.
I see your point and yes, I will admit that as a taxpayer where I live I would be annoyed if my taxes had to go to bail out a city like Flint because they mismanaged their money or whatever. But I will say that I would feel good at the end of the day if $10 or even $100 had to come out of my own pocket so that an entire city could have clean water. Something could have been arranged. A loan. A bailout. Something. If the government can bail out huge banks for trillions of dollars, why can't they bail out a city when they are having a crisis like this? Why did it have to come to this? I would get it if they made an honest mistake but by all accounts everyone knew that the river was polluted to begin with. The water was coming out of the taps brown and they said to keep drinking it. The entire situation does not sit right with me.
This is the problem with Republicans and a lot of people in government in general. They value businesses and money more than they value people. Yes, we need businesses to drive our economy and give us all food to eat. But at the end of the day it's our people that run our entire countries. You have to take care of both to be successful.
At the end of the day, money is just one of the things we have. You can't take it with you when you die. IMO it's going to do a lot more good helping out the poor and the people in need in this world than it is going to do in some rich guy's bank account. Heck, the rich don't even pay taxes, they keep all their money off shore. And yet you want to tax them less? It just doesn't make sense.
I don't know what info led to the decisions at Flint, but I'd bet money they didn't knowingly say "Lets give them tainted water, maybe no one will notice.
I do know the lead in the water comes from the lead pipe infrastructure and the aging coating of the pipes decaying, not the river water itself.
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/flint-w...go-n510116
Water pipes around the world are made of lead and in the process of being swapped out due to this issue.
https://www.safeplumbing.org/health-safe...n-plumbing
As far as the brown water goes, I was sitting by the edge of the lake at my cabin a few years back when a neighbor came by in his boat, bass fishing. The water is as brown as coffee with cream, stained by tree roots. That guy told me he had it tested, and that the quality actually was better than you would think to look at it. Said he boils it to kill bacteria, and uses it to make "swampwater" cocktails that he drinks out of a mason jar.
Point being that water being discolored doesn't necessarily mean it's toxic, or untreatable.
This isn't me excusing the MI government, public safety is job one for government.
Yes it is depressing. When you show up in a town where they tell you, "We used to make a part for Ford that we sold them for $150, then they started buying it from China for $30 and we lost our main employer." it breaks your heart hearing about how it rippled through the town economy and left them broke. They didn't mismanage anything- they just live in a place where a living wage is far higher than China and foreign competition forced Ford to cut corners to compete.
That is why I buy a truck built in America every 3 years, and a boat built in America every 5-6. If people like me don't support American labor, who will?