Thread: Obama bans federal funding for embryonic stem cell research

Originally Posted by gismo

Yea, because social programmes are a terrible use of tax money. Helping people out and trying to help them pull themselves up and be better people is such a shitty use of tax money, because everyone is in the same situation and of the same mental/emotional strength to make it on their own.

I want my tax to go to stuff like invading other countries for no reason, or disinforming teenagers about the evils of pre marital sex, instead of helping my fellow country men and women who don't have it as good as I do and need a little assistance.

I don't get conservatives. Social programmes are worthwhile. When you turn your back on those in the gutter, telling them that it is their problem, not yours, eventually it becomes everyones problem. So what if some squander it, waste their opportunities, there will be those who do benefit and can turn it around and that is what makes it worthwhile.

I'm gonna go ahead and ask for proof these social programs work. Where are the statistics of people who are using these programs are able pull themselves together and pull off it.

Social programs just allow those unfit in society to leech off others who are.

Originally Posted by Barack Dalai Lama

By "unfit" you basically mean "the damned darkies who pollute our glorious suburban Valhalla." Meanwhile, the "unfit" (who actually do work) have many organizations to be proud of such as the New Black Panther Party, Five Percenters, etc. Breakfast for Children back in the 60's did far more for the "unfit" than the government did.

No by unfit, I mean those who do nothing, and expect things to be given to them. IE- UAW members who remained in the job bank for years while collecting unemployment. Or those who have children when they don't have the means to support those kids and collect welfare on it. Race has nothing to do with it.

Of course, if by chance there is a racial group that does this or is more often found in these situations, that's your perspective, not mine. Social cancer has no race.

Originally Posted by gismo

Yea, because social programmes are a terrible use of tax money. Helping people out and trying to help them pull themselves up and be better people is such a shitty use of tax money, because everyone is in the same situation and of the same mental/emotional strength to make it on their own.

I want my tax to go to stuff like invading other countries for no reason, or disinforming teenagers about the evils of pre marital sex, instead of helping my fellow country men and women who don't have it as good as I do and need a little assistance.

I don't get conservatives. Social programmes are worthwhile. When you turn your back on those in the gutter, telling them that it is their problem, not yours, eventually it becomes everyones problem. So what if some squander it, waste their opportunities, there will be those who do benefit and can turn it around and that is what makes it worthwhile.

You might be reading, but you certainly aren't comprehending. I didn't say that we should turn our backs on "those in the gutter." I didn't say social programs aren't worthwhile. I've said multiple times on the various incarnations of CD and LWS that I probably give more of my time and money to philanthropic efforts than anyone else here. In fact, in 2009 alone I organized, participated in, and donated to a charity golf tournament, a charity casino night, and volunteered at Habitat for Humanity. It's an absolute joke to say I don't care about people less fortunate than me (well, okay... it's at least a joke to say I don't give back to those people, even if I don't care.)

It's not the place of the government to redistribute wealth by taxing me and giving it to "those in the gutter." If I want to give my time and money to benefit people less fortunate than me, that's my prerogative. If I want to retain earnings in my business so that I can continue to employ the people who work for me, rather than being forced to cut costs, that, too, is my prerogative.

Originally Posted by sycld

Science research funding represents less than 2% of the national budget, maybe something like 1.5%.

Also, since when was research that was responsible for a whole array of technologies that we take for granted and whose production drives the national economy "horrifically inefficient," given that this knowledge comes from such a small fraction of the national budget? It's said that the economic benefit of every dollar spent in basic research is many times greater (exactly how much I unfortunately don't remember), though of course this benefit is a long-term one.

Finally, if you want a model of horrific inefficiency, why don't you attack defense appropriations, which is 1/3 of the national budget? There is essentially no accountability there, and potentially billions of dollars just go up in smoke through embezzlement, ineffectual programs, etc.

I'll never understand why science spending is one of the first targets of public ire during economically difficult times, given that scientific research represents such a tiny fraction of the national budget.



EDIT: On the other hand, if there was an effective commercial system set up for funding science rather than having almost all basic science funded by the government, that'd be great...

Well, I agree that 2% is a sufficiently small portion of the Federal budget that it's not worth battling over in Washington.

However, the whole system is embarrassing. The Federal Government gives gigantic grants to researchers at Universities, who turn around and license their own developments to their privately-held start-ups for pennies, and then sit on all the profits. The taxpayers get no equity out of the deal; it's a bad investment. Of course, I'm not advocating the government start making money on the science budget; they need to stop the spending and let private firms and non-profits handle it.

I agree that we do need an effective commercial system, and I would like to see the government put its money toward making that system run rather than making direct investment (this would, of course, require less money--which should be returned to the taxpayers who paid it.)

Originally Posted by sycld

Well, let me put it this way: 2% is extremely small considering how much science funding gets attacked and is the focus of cuts. It is also extremely small considering how beneficial it is.

And if we just consider money that goes to the DoD as "defense spending," then it's something more like 21 to 23% of the budget.

I ignored it earlier so that I can address it here: the Department of Defense is a necessarily unique entity for the government and while I do not like it for economic principle, I do recognize it's legitimacy in terms of national security. While it is true that DoD spending is largely unregulated, inefficient, and often amounts to a subsidy for American industries that really don't have a competitive advantage over foreign counterparts, this is a necessary evil because we would rather keep our money invested domestically to provide for defense than rely on a foreign power for current wartime technology. While it is contrary to the free market because America is no longer an ideal location for DoD-quality heavy manufacturing, this spending allows us to control our own defensive technology.

A good example of this was Boeing in the 90s, which brought a lot of litigation against Airbus both in America and in Europe, claiming that Airbus' association with European governments gave it a competitive advantage (basically, Airbus had been operating at a loss for 30 years while it continued to take marketshare from Boeing--a company in the free market would have gone bankrupt years before without so much government consortium backing.) Airbus turned around and alleged that Department of Defense contracts were so horribly managed and monitored that they effectively amounted to the same government subsidies Airbus received. The takeaway here is that DoD spending is a form of government subsidy that allows many of our defense manufacturers to continue producing and developing the best military technology; most of the companies that receive their contracts couldn't afford to produce the best defense products if the government didn't help them out because the only market for them is the government.

Unfortunately, the military-industrial complex can't be undone without sacrificing our military strength, which would be not only political suicide but also could very well amount to actual suicide.

Originally Posted by Barack Dalai Lama

By "unfit" you basically mean "the damned darkies who pollute our glorious suburban Valhalla." Meanwhile, the "unfit" (who actually do work) have many organizations to be proud of such as the New Black Panther Party, Five Percenters, etc. Breakfast for Children back in the 60's did far more for the "unfit" than the government did.

I think it's funny that he was supporting my point of view (that the government is inefficient and shouldn't be involved in social programs), and then as a counter-argument, you listed a number of private (read: non-government) groups that provided social outreach more effectively than the government.

You literally just made our point; the government doesn't need to be involved because private sector non-profits are simply more effective.

Originally Posted by Atmosfear

You literally just made our point; the government doesn't need to be involved because private sector non-profits are simply more effective.

I don't know exactly how this fits into the debate, but there is always a struggle with non-profits to make sure they have enough cash to stay afloat. The first example I have is a privately run NPO called Leave Out ViolencE, which specialized in rehabilitating street youth to be independant and learn how to, eventually, become valuable members of society. Part of my own volunteer work there was transcribing hand-written accounts of abuse, be it drugs, physical or sexual, onto a computer for archival purposes, which was a depressing job, but that isn't the point. The point there was that their staff consisted of three people, the executive director who managed the business side of the organization, the program director who organized and ran the presentations and recruitment drives and the photojournalism course (the heart of the program) teacher. In spite of having a small staff and small overhead, the program was, in the best of times, 6 months from going under (well before I showed up), and at worst of times roughly a month(shortly before I showed up).

Their biggest obstacle was funding. The first 5 years were fine, because the government of British Columbia provided a provincial grant geared to start-up NPO's in the province. After 5 years had passed, the backbone of their funding was cut out and the government had no more grants to offer that fit the mold. They borrowed from philanthropist businessmen in Vancouver, and spent the majority of their energy in the 3 months I was there making asks from corporations and philanthropists to keep in business. This isn't to say that they neglected their mission statement, but more that they couldn't focus on the mission statement because their energy had to be spent on ensuring that they could continue to operate. They weren't a business that sold things to raise funding, they were a community service provider to those who could not afford it themselves.

The point that I'm making here is that the program, if it received steady government funding for the social work it was doing, social work desperately needed in the state Vancover is in, they would be able to deliver their message and recruit others on a wider basis and with more impact than they do currently. Fortunately, their new hire as ED of the board (whose first day on the job was also my own) had majored in fundraising in her business studies, which was a desperately needed asset.

I think that NPOs that provide a valuable social service should be funded by the government, because they improve the social fabric of whatever area they are in. When they don't receive funding, they have to hire people whose sole purpose is to bring in more and more money into the system without actually doing anything to benefit their cause.

An extreme example of this is the Mothers Against Drunk Driving Scandal, which is really just the tip of the iceberg. 81% of their earnings were used to cover administrative and telemarketing fees. They disputed the allegations made by saying that because they used certain wording in their asks through telemarketers and door-to-door askers, it counted as 'education' under their mission statement, and so they presented it as being funding spent on the execution of said mission.

This is where my issue with the idea of government funding comes in. When the NPO has to spend that much (time and money) on ensuring a constant revenue stream, it's very easy to slip into being an organization that exists solely to fundraise and continue it's own existence, rather than effectively funding programs in the communities on the levels they say they are. In this case, they are using a tragic occurence as a high horse to ask for money, but the action they take is minimal. If the government would help to fund these NPOs and they, in turn, focused more on their work, rather than asking for cash, I'm sure they would be significantly more effective.

Of course there are logistical nightmares within this that I haven't thought out yet, but still, government funding is something necessary, especially in regards to social programs.

Originally Posted by coqauvin

I don't know exactly how this fits into the debate, but there is always a struggle with non-profits to make sure they have enough cash to stay afloat. The first example I have is a privately run NPO called Leave Out ViolencE, which specialized in rehabilitating street youth to be independant and learn how to, eventually, become valuable members of society. Part of my own volunteer work there was transcribing hand-written accounts of abuse, be it drugs, physical or sexual, onto a computer for archival purposes, which was a depressing job, but that isn't the point. The point there was that their staff consisted of three people, the executive director who managed the business side of the organization, the program director who organized and ran the presentations and recruitment drives and the photojournalism course (the heart of the program) teacher. In spite of having a small staff and small overhead, the program was, in the best of times, 6 months from going under (well before I showed up), and at worst of times roughly a month(shortly before I showed up).

Their biggest obstacle was funding. The first 5 years were fine, because the government of British Columbia provided a provincial grant geared to start-up NPO's in the province. After 5 years had passed, the backbone of their funding was cut out and the government had no more grants to offer that fit the mold. They borrowed from philanthropist businessmen in Vancouver, and spent the majority of their energy in the 3 months I was there making asks from corporations and philanthropists to keep in business. This isn't to say that they neglected their mission statement, but more that they couldn't focus on the mission statement because their energy had to be spent on ensuring that they could continue to operate. They weren't a business that sold things to raise funding, they were a community service provider to those who could not afford it themselves.

The point that I'm making here is that the program, if it received steady government funding for the social work it was doing, social work desperately needed in the state Vancover is in, they would be able to deliver their message and recruit others on a wider basis and with more impact than they do currently. Fortunately, their new hire as ED of the board (whose first day on the job was also my own) had majored in fundraising in her business studies, which was a desperately needed asset.

I think that NPOs that provide a valuable social service should be funded by the government, because they improve the social fabric of whatever area they are in. When they don't receive funding, they have to hire people whose sole purpose is to bring in more and more money into the system without actually doing anything to benefit their cause.

An extreme example of this is the Mothers Against Drunk Driving Scandal, which is really just the tip of the iceberg. 81% of their earnings were used to cover administrative and telemarketing fees. They disputed the allegations made by saying that because they used certain wording in their asks through telemarketers and door-to-door askers, it counted as 'education' under their mission statement, and so they presented it as being funding spent on the execution of said mission.

This is where my issue with the idea of government funding comes in. When the NPO has to spend that much (time and money) on ensuring a constant revenue stream, it's very easy to slip into being an organization that exists solely to fundraise and continue it's own existence, rather than effectively funding programs in the communities on the levels they say they are. In this case, they are using a tragic occurence as a high horse to ask for money, but the action they take is minimal. If the government would help to fund these NPOs and they, in turn, focused more on their work, rather than asking for cash, I'm sure they would be significantly more effective.

Of course there are logistical nightmares within this that I haven't thought out yet, but still, government funding is something necessary, especially in regards to social programs.

You see this scenario as evidence that the government should be funding these programs. I see it as evidence that the government should be enabling the private funding of these programs. The government does have a unique ability to unite philanthropic offerings with groups requiring money; since non-profits are government-regulated, the government has a great deal of knowledge about their workings and needs and can bridge the gap between people willing to give and the organizations needing money. The government should be providing access to money, not providing the money.

Consider how much more efficient the system would be if the government's budget for NPO funding was eliminated and instead offered as a tax incentive; if you give to an NPO, you receive a credit on your taxes in the amount X, totaling the same giving. This encourages the programs while letting us decide how we give our money.