We should allow "Italy to fail" if not letting them fail means giving them bail outs

Reasons to agree:

1. The concept of Italy failing is ridiculous. This isn't a game with winners and looser. Italy may be less successful, or more successful but it probably be more successful than 1/2 of this planet's countries. They are more successful than most countries in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia. If we are supposed to rescue Italy, we should probably rescue the rest of the world first. 


2. Italy isn't helping us in Afghanistan, why should we help them? 




1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Security_Assistance_Force
   




3. Greece isn't helping us much in Afghanistan. Why should we help them?




1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Security_Assistance_Force
   




4. They have the capacity to deal with that themselves. 
   


5. We shouldn't try to do impossible things. It is impossible for the United States Government to make another large economy successful. 




1. Italy is a very large economy. 


2. We should bail out California before we bail out Italy. And there is no reason for farmers in North Dakota to pay for healthcare benefits of people living in San Fransico, let alone a country that looks down on us from the otherside of the planet. 




6. Europe is able to take care of their own problems. 




1. Those who would be hurt most if Italy fails, should give the most.


2. Europe is able to help Europe.


3. We would help if we could, but we got our own problems.




1. If we stay on the course we're on, with the level of borrowing this administration is carrying out, if we don't get serious about cutting and capping our spending and balancing our budget, you're going to find America in the same position Italy is in four or five years from now, and that is unacceptable. We got to fix our deficit here.




4. We with WWI, and WWII. They will have to do this alone. 


5. Some Europeans resented our help in the past. 


6. We should avoid foreign entanglements. 




7. Those who say we shouldn't let them fail, are implying that we should bail out their banks or government. 


8. Efficient capitalism requires fair competition. When people are competing with money, those who fail should not be given more money. If those who don't deserve to be given money, keep getting more money, then those those who should be trusted with money will have less. If no one can fail: bad behavior is rewarded until more people fail. 

Reasons to disagree:

1.  It feels good to give people things! Maybe they will like us! :) :)


2. It's not like we don't have money?!


3. Government is the perfect way to feel good about giving people stuff! You get all the self righteousness of saying we should be nice, and don't ever have to realize that you have to pay for it in taxes. And if your one of the lucky 55% of people in this country, you might never have to pay taxes! So why not give money to Italy! You won't have to pay for it! As long as you make slightly less than average, you won't have to pay a penny!

Interests

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 8

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 1

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1. You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity, by legislating the wealth out of prosperity.


2. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving.


3. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.


4. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.


5. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them; and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work, because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that is the beginning of the end of any nation.

We are broke

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Interests

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 1

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 1

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We should enact far stiffer penalties for those who steal from taxpayers

Reasons to agree:

1. Cutting improper payments in half could save more than $60 billion a year.


2. We are broke. 

Score:

# of reasons to agree: 1

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 1

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

(+2) We should Attack rampant fraud in government programs

Reasons to agree:

1. Another big category is overcharging state Medicaid programs. That accounts for the most settlements, 43 percent of all violations. Most of these violations took the form of companies publishing inflated benchmark prices that set the base for Medicaid drug payments. "In some cases, state Medicaid programs were paying providers as much as 12 times the actual cost of a drug," the new report says.


2. We are broke. 

Website that agree

1. http://www.taf.org/whyfca.htm


2. http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2011/07/11/the-government-fraud-racket/


3. http://www.gao.gov/fraudnet/fraudnet.htm


4. http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2010/12/17/132134328/when-it-comes-to-government-fraud-health-care-now-tops-defense


5. http://www.texaswatchdog.org/2011/11/watchdog-agency-finds-fraud-mismanagement-few-shovel-ready-stimulus-jobs/1320694281.column

Score:

# of reasons to agree: 2

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 2

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We should repeal the Davis-Bacon Act

Website that agree

1. http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/02/repealing-the-davis-bacon-act-would-save-taxpayers-$10-9-billion

Reasons to agree:

1. We are broke.


2. Suspending the DBA means hiring five workers at market rates instead of hiring four workers at a 22 percent premium.


3. If we have a limited amount of money, it is better to employ more construction workers than to pay a lot to the few that kiss up to their union bosses. We do have a limited amount of money. We can no longer pretend that we have an unlimited amount of money. We may want to give really high wages to give to everyone, but we shouldn't make rules that require the federal government to overpay their workers. 


4. If Congress is not willing to reduce construction spending, suspending the DBA would make each public construction dollar go 9.9 percent further. This would create more bridges and buildings at the same cost to taxpayers. It would also employ 155,000 more construction workers. 


5. The Davis–Bacon Act (DBA) requires the government to pay construction wages that average 22 percent above market rates.


6. The Department of Labor (DOL) estimates DBA rates using a highly flawed methodology. Under the DBA, contractors on all federally funded construction projects must pay their workers at least prevailing market wages. However, the Department of Labor (DOL) estimates DBA rates using a highly flawed methodology. The Inspector General has criticized the DOL for:




1. Using a self-selected sample instead of a scientific random sample to estimate DBA rates;


2. Allowing 100 percent error rates in audited samples of returned DBA surveys; and


3. Permitting long delays in updating DBA surveys.[3]




7. We are broke.


8. The Davis-Bacon Act was a union giveaway.


9. The Davis Bacon Act artificially raises costs for government projects.


10. Removing the Davis-Bacon act would save taxpayers more than $10 billion a year in the process


11. The Davis-Bacon Act was a Jim Crow law.


12. The Davis-Bacon Act was passed to prevent African Americans from working on government projects.




1. Congressional representative John Cochran of Missouri said that he supported the Davis–Bacon Act because he had "received numerous complaints in recent months about Southern contractors' employing low-paid colored mechanics getting work and bringing the employees from the South." (Williams, Walter Congress' insidious discrimination. Jewish World Review March 12, 2003 / 8 Adar II, 5763).


2. Congressional representative Clayton Allgood of Alabama said that he supported Davis-Bacon because "Reference has been made to a contractor from Alabama who went to New York with bootleg labor. This is a fact. That contractor has cheap colored labor that he transports, and he puts them in cabins, and it is labor of that sort that is in competition with white labor throughout the country." (Williams, Walter Congress' insidious discrimination. Jewish World Review March 12, 2003 / 8 Adar II, 5763).




13. The free market can not work, when the market is not free.


14. The Davis-Bacon Act was a big government solution that harms the tax payer, by forcing government projects to cost more. We could have never built the rail roads without cheap labor. If they could unions would run every productive activity out of the country, as long as they could be paid 6 figures to do nothing. If American citizens want to work for less on Government projects, then that is good for the tax payer. All jobs can't be high paying. Unfortunately low skilled jobs are going to have to be low skilled. When government steps in and tries to force low skilled jobs to pay well, then they remove the insensitive to gain skills. It is better to live under the strong arm of efficiency, than be stabbed in the back by professional do-gooders that turn the world upside down. 

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 1

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 1

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The federal government should align compensation with the private sector

 Reasons to agree:

1. We are broke. 


2. Federal jobs have typically had better benefits, but they did not make as much as private sector jobs.


3. Even people who work for the government should acknowledge that our country is going to have a bad future, if our best and brightest work for the government.  


4. With projections of huge federal deficits for years to come, policymakers should scour the budget looking for places to cut spending


5. The OWS protest should look to government with anger at their compensation more so than looking at CEOs. 


6. During the last decade, compensation of federal employees rose much faster than compensation of private-sector employees.


7. The average federal civilian worker now earns twice as much in wages and benefits as the average worker in the U.S. private sector.


8. A recent job-to-job comparison found that federal workers earned higher wages than did private-sector workers in four-fifths of the occupations examined.


9. It is unfair to ask taxpayers to foot an ever-increasing bill for federal workers, especially when private-sector compensation has not kept pace. We pay for their jobs. They should not be making more money than us. They don't produce anything. Government should be small. It should protect us and that is about it. 

Reasons to disagree:

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Interests

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Common Interest

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Website that agree

1. http://www.downsizinggovernment.org/overpaid-federal-workers

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Score:

# of reasons to agree: 1

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 1

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change

Images

A picture says a thousand words. Why would we keep them out of a debate? Why not have the top 10 pictures that support AND oppose the same issue.

Of course images are returned to Google based on an algorithm, images that have higher scores will contribute more power to the idea.

(+6) We should reduce the federal workforce through attrition

Reasons to agree:

1. The federal government is too big. 


2. Federal spending should not exceed 20% of GDP (+5).

Score:

# of reasons to agree: 1

# of reasons to disagree: -0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to agree: 0

# of reasons to agree with reasons to disagree: -0

Total Idea Score: 1

Don't like the score? It is easy to change the score. Just post a reason to agree or disagree with the overall idea, or any of the reasons and the score will change