Fox News: fair and balanced

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Originally Posted by 500grains

IDEA: Move to Finland.

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Pretty funny that you hold up Finland as the bastion of liberalism. Because Finland has the highest quality of life according to Readers Digest. In 2005 Finland was ranked ahead of the United States in the Economist Intelligence Unit’s quality of life index. According to a Newsweek study, Finland is the best overall country in the world to live. Public healthcare, high taxes, one of the most comprehensive social welfare programs in the world, a healthy economy, etc.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

Pretty funny that you hold up Finland as the bastion of liberalism. Because Finland has the highest quality of life according to Readers Digest. In 2005 Finland was ranked ahead of the United States in the Economist Intelligence Unit’s quality of life index. According to a Newsweek study, Finland is the best overall country in the world to live. Public healthcare, high taxes, one of the most comprehensive social welfare programs in the world, a healthy economy, etc.

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When socialism is your criteria for defining "quality of life" it is hardly surprising that a socialist country would win.

By the same token if you used the criteria of "crime statistics" I'm sure 1940 Germany would get excellent marks. But I don't think that exactly equates to most people's concept of "quality of life" any more than high taxes does.

Also keep in mind one of the reasons most Western European socialism works is because they don't have to defend themselves from the same kind of threats we do since they are not a nuclear power. When the only really important thing you have to do is make chocolate and yodel you tend to have money left over.

This is of course not an attempt to deride Finland's capacity for national defense, you can ask Russia about that one. But during the Cold War we mostly picked up the tab to protect them from the bear.

Then there is also the cultural considerations. Finland's socialism works because they don't have 20 million illegals jacking them for services and a 20% population of "baby mama's" living on the dole. If everyone on the US had a similar work ethic and we took the same stance regarding immigration as many Western Euro countries we'd probably be bailing out Chinese industries.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

Its not meaningless at all. There's also this study...

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There's no context there at all.

Who did the "study" and what were the "misperceptions"?

Edit- I missed "PIPA" in the quote. I'll have to Google them.

There's still no context in the quoted text.

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Now I'm not defending the NYT or Brady or MSNBC or any of them, but technically the stats do say that. Problem is the stats don't reflect reality.

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If I'm not mistaken the actual stat was that 90% of the guns which the Mexicans tagged as coming from the US actually had. A far cry from the "MSM" reporting repeatedly that "90% of the guns in Mexico come from the US".

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

When socialism is your criteria for defining "quality of life" it is hardly surprising that a socialist country would win.

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There's a lot more to it than that.

The Newsweek criteria were health, economic dynamism (the openness of a country's economy and the breadth of its corporate sector), education, political environment, and quality of life.

The Economist Intelligence Unit's criteria were Health, Family life, Community life, Material well being, Political stability and security, Climate and geography, Job security, Political freedom, and Gender equality

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

This is of course not an attempt to deride Finland's capacity for national defense, you can ask Russia about that one. But during the Cold War we mostly picked up the tab to protect them from the bear.

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Finland actually had a pretty close relationship with the Soviet Union, including trade. For example, the Agreement of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance they shared.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finno-S...Treaty_of_1948

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

Then there is also the cultural considerations. Finland's socialism works because they don't have 20 million illegals jacking them for services and a 20% population of "baby mama's" living on the dole. If everyone on the US had a similar work ethic and we took the same stance regarding immigration as many Western Euro countries we'd probably be bailing out Chinese industries.

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Actually Finland is much more of a welfare state than our country. They pay nothing for childcare or education at any level including medical or law school, very little for healthcare, indefinite unemployment benefits that are very generous, and the elderly are well cared for.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

There's a lot more to it than that.

The Newsweek criteria were health, economic dynamism (the openness of a country's economy and the breadth of its corporate sector), education, political environment, and quality of life.

The Economist Intelligence Unit's criteria were Health, Family life, Community life, Material well being, Political stability and security, Climate and geography, Job security, Political freedom, and Gender equality

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I'm not doubting you so much as various criteria often used. I've seen the US rated below other countries in terms of quality of medical care simply because "socialized health care" was one of the bigger criteria. This of course leads people to believe that the US doesn't lead most countries in terms of actual quality of health care available which simply isn't true.

But lets take your stated criteria, who decides what kind of economic dynamism is good? Some consider heavy regulation the best part, others consider the free market more important and each person will have vastly different opinions on which one equates to best quality of life. How about political environment, take a person from Texas and move them to NY and they will think they are in political HELL. By the same token the average NYer will feel like they are in similar political hell if moved to Texas. Who gets to be correct in their assessment of politics?

That's the point I'm trying to make.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

Finland actually had a pretty close relationship with the Soviet Union, including trade. For example, the Agreement of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Assistance they shared.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finno-S...Treaty_of_1948

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Well yeah now. I was alluding to the Winter War.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

Actually Finland is much more of a welfare state than our country. They pay nothing for childcare or education at any level including medical or law school, very little for healthcare, indefinite unemployment benefits that are very generous, and the elderly are well cared for.

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With one HUGE difference. A far more traditional work ethic and almost nobody sitting on their ass at home watching Oprah while they draw benefits. If you have smaller populations (like Europe where entire countries are similar to our states) and virtually everyone actually works and contributes basic socialism CAN work on that scale without becoming a second world country.

It just can't work on the scale of something like the United States without having all the problems of the former USSR. And keep in mind the work ethic in the former USSR was probably superior to the average welfare minded American.

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Originally Posted by Jerm

There's no context there at all.

Who did the "study" and what were the "misperceptions"?

Edit- I missed "PIPA" in the quote. I'll have to Google them.

There's still no context in the quoted text.




If I'm not mistaken the actual stat was that 90% of the guns which the Mexicans tagged as coming from the US actually had. A far cry from the "MSM" reporting repeatedly that "90% of the guns in Mexico come from the US".

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Here's the first study...

http://people-press.org/report/319/p...on-revolutions

and here's the link to the PIPA study.

http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Ir..._Oct03_rpt.pdf

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

I'm not doubting you so much as various criteria often used. I've seen the US rated below other countries in terms of quality of medical care simply because "socialized health care" was one of the bigger criteria. This of course leads people to believe that the US doesn't lead most countries in terms of actual quality of health care available which simply isn't true.

But lets take your stated criteria, who decides what kind of economic dynamism is good? Some consider heavy regulation the best part, others consider the free market more important and each person will have vastly different opinions on which one equates to best quality of life. How about political environment, take a person from Texas and move them to NY and they will think they are in political HELL. By the same token the average NYer will feel like they are in similar political hell if moved to Texas. Who gets to be correct in their assessment of politics?

That's the point I'm trying to make.

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Fair enough. But I think if you look at how they measured these benchmarks, they were quite fair in their assessments.

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

Well yeah now. I was alluding to the Winter War.

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Ok. Whenever I think of Cold War I think post WWII.

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

With one HUGE difference. A far more traditional work ethic and almost nobody sitting on their ass at home watching Oprah while they draw benefits. If you have smaller populations (like Europe where entire countries are similar to our states) and virtually everyone actually works and contributes basic socialism CAN work on that scale without becoming a second world country.

It just can't work on the scale of something like the United States without having all the problems of the former USSR. And keep in mind the work ethic in the former USSR was probably superior to the average welfare minded American.

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Yea, its a much larger scale here in the US. But our unemployment rates are about the same. Fortunately for Finland, they can afford it because they haven't ran themselves into debt like we have.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

Fair enough. But I think if you look at how they measured these benchmarks, they were quite fair in their assessments.

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Honestly, having been to Europe more than a few times, it seems like quite a nice place to live. I'd rather live there than Los Angeles. That said there are a LOT of places in Europe I wouldn't want to live and I sure wouldn't want to pay most of their taxes.

But I think it is the Scandinavian people and culture that are responsible for that high qualify of life rather than their socialism.

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Originally Posted by rickrock305

Yea, its a much larger scale here in the US. But our unemployment rates are about the same. Fortunately for Finland, they can afford it because they haven't ran themselves into debt like we have.

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Looks like Finland is about 8% and we are currently about 10%, the important part is the huge difference between the population of Finland and the US and the disparity in actual numbers that those percentages actually represent.

For example it is a lot easier and cheaper to feed, clothe and house 1% of Finland's population compared to 1% of ours.

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Originally Posted by SteyrAUG

For example it is a lot easier and cheaper to feed, clothe and house 1% of Finland's population compared to 1% of ours.

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Objectively, yes, but theoretically our larger population is supposed to have larger tax revenues to offset the larger cost and it should all balance out...

Except we've nickel-and-dimed ourselves to death by sending manufacturing overseas and making Wal-Mart king of America and thus most of our employed pay little to no taxes because they don't make anything, forcing a smaller percentage of the population to shoulder the tax burden.
The key to economic solidity is protective tariffs on imports. The U.S. has GOT to stop playing the free market game when every other nation in the world cheats.

Ruport Murdoch is a Bilderberger and has something to lose if Ron Paul were to become president.

Ron Paul is 100% anti globalist, anti secret society, anti selling out America to make bankers our masters

It doesn't take rocket science to figure out what the deal is. Don't expect any Bilderberg affiliated jackals to jump for joy at the idea of a candidate/President Ron Paul...

Mind you, George Soros is a Bilderberger too, so expect a tidal wave of shit from Fox and MSNBC just so Ron Paul can be stopped and destroyed, because none of the elites want this guy or his son in power.