menageriemanor

I'm not sure if I have used the QUOTE button correctly. I've never tried before. Dekan, is it? I am gobsmacked that you are so happy to openly display so much ignorance in so many fields, in your sweeping and laughable comments. It was commonplace for Europeans to stand or squat by roadsides, to defecate, in centuries past. Male and female. Certainly well into the 19th century. We also used chamberpots, during the night, or in cold, and in morning, in the cities, towns and villages, we threw it, often from bedroom windows, out into the road our houses fronted. The French had a well known yell of warning, when chucking the contents of their chamberpot, from above, into the street. The Royal French Court was infamous for STINKING of stale urine, as courtiers p*ssed against palace walls. In France, the custom carried on well into the 19th century, so that if you travelled and actually had knowledge of history, you would see, STILL in use, PISSOIRS, usually decorative, ornate wrought iron streetside places for men to continue to p*ss in the street, many made in the late 19th century, now set up with drainage, etc Often, they are only shielding passers by, from the sight of urination, by a decorative piece of iron, at low chest height, to knee height, if lucky. Regency Dandies in London, would often pay to be carried home in chairs, lifted by 2 men, holding the chairs off the ground by poles, so they wouldn't have to walk in old, raw sewage, lying in puddles on the street. There are so many ridiculous, ignorant claims in your loony declarations, I can't remember them, to actually address them. I believe there is a thread listed here, IS IGNORANCE BLISS?. I suggest that you read it. and submit your photo, so we can all see what bliss looks like. The toying with live and dead prey has nothing to do with cruelty. It is distressing to see, but that play is used in young animals, (usually those that are seen doing it), to improve hunting skills, to improve hunting technique, SO THEY CAN SURVIVE. It is not done when food is sparse. It can't be risked being lost. Most mature adults DON'T do it. Tho they will, when prey is plentiful, try to encourage their growing young to practise in play. Do not human hunters practise shooting before their first hunt? It is a skill that has to be learnt. It's just that we humans tend to kill from a distance, with overpowered rifles, and call it SPORT. Are they doing it to survive? In many cases, no. They live on McDonalds and beer and marry their cousins. Many do it simply for a trophy. ALL HAIL the MORALLY SUPERIOR SPECIES. I am just not in the mood to take smug ignorance bellowing they know all, when they are demonstrably SO IGNORANT, they are actually bellowing I am a SMUG MORON. Clearly, I didn't use the quote button correctly...

So, speaking for the numerically illiterate, when I ended a sentence with a number and exclamation mark, I was 1) upsetting the mindset of a mathematician, 2) displaying my numerical illiteracy to all? So, no change, then... I'd just like to register a protest at the wholescale thievery of the already spoken for letters and symbols of the language of alphabets. It's not like you're thick. Keep to the original symbols you come up with, and leave us to bunker down with the last few letters and symbols we can be sure you haven't seduced and taken to your mathematical Las Vegas, where every figure probably has a 2nd, secret life, in an amoral, louche existance... To those who left, remember we will always love you, and you can always come home, even if your reputation is dust. Have you taken the innocence of alL, already?

You can always get a kitten, in the kitten season. If you go to a quality rescue, the kittens and cats have had all shots, desexing, etc, and it is FAR LESS LIKELY you will take a kitten home and find it is ill and possibly dies, as happens regularly, if you get a suburban kitten, from a cat and kittens not protected from vaccinations. Often kittens in pet shops are from puppy/kitten mills. They aren't bred knowledgeably, for the most part, and haven't had good nutrition or vaccinations. I've lost count of the number of people with tales of distraught children getting a kitten from pet shop, that soon falls ill and dies. Remember, ALL kittens are cute, but within a couple of months, they look like an adult, and as kittens, you never know if your kitten will be bad tempered, or a slasher, as an adult. If you go to quality rescue, tell them what your dream cat is, personality wise, they KNOW the cats in their care. An adult doesn't change in personality, unless mistreated, or ill or in pain. THAT is the way to get a dream cat. Purebred cats DO come in, if you are prepared to wait, and nowadays, most individual cat breeds have a rescue/rehome section in the breed club/association. Many cats are from wonderful homes, lovely cats, only in rescue due to death of owner, illness and care home residency that does not allow pets, or sadly, at present, bankruptcy and loss of home. If you are a real animal lover, consider taking an established pair. They then amuse themselves, when you are out, they love each other's company. It is hard to find people who will take 2, and you, the rescue and the cats will be SO happy. Think about taking a 3 legged cat, and if it can have an indoor life, ideally, with dog safe enclosure, consider a deaf or blind cat, often overlooked but so grateful for a quiet, gentle, adult home. (Blind cats need NEAT people. It's mean to leave things all over the place, different, every day...) Also, please consider taking black or black and white cats. They are far less likely to be picked, JUST from colour, and so many more of them are PTS. If you are looking, hope you choose wisely, and have a very happy and long mutual lovefest. http://www.care2.com/causes/10-reasons-to-adopt-a-shelter-cat.html

To see someone suffering, desperately wanting death... if it was done as gently and kindly as my vet PTS's my animals, it is an act of gentle kindness. My dogs are eating roast chicken, happily, as they get their needle. They die literally, in mid chew. Not a moment of suffering shown. If that person, in that suffering, WANTING death, costing thousands of pounds per week to keep alive, is given those resources, someone, somewhere else, WANTING life, needing treatment, is held up, in the public system, NOT getting the care they need because the funds/beds are not there. Many of these people are in the public system, often having not worked, with illness or injury. So those believing they are fighting for every life are in fantasy land. You are in effect, CHOOSING life for one, and so denying help to those who die, who desperately want life, because they can't get into the system, or who live in great suffering, because the op to help cannot be justified, when budget constraints mean those with less likelihood of survival, are denied, because that is the reality of budgets in hospitals, and that person, wanting death, is within the system, using a lot of funds. The reality of the health system is NOT PRETTY. To argue this, is without understanding that in refusing to help someone end their suffering, you also often block someone from the gift of life they are desperate for. the quality of life they could have, but for funds. The hospital system is not funded by a fountain of money, directed wherever needed. I DON'T use this to push for the poor to be PTS. The wealthy may have the money to pay for an extended life, but if they don't want it, with their quality of life, their wealth may be seen as an unending open cheque by a private hospital. I find it madness that many who screech at the sanctity of life, often don't care enough to fight to save whole species of healthy animals, that are hunted, slaughtered for recreation and thuggish pleasure, whittled in numbers to extinction, whilst bleating that great grandpa, now a wasted, ,suffering, rarely conscious poo and urine machine, has another 6 months of life dragged out, with the use of multimillion dollar equipment, against his will, when rational. There are NO UNLIMITED funds for hospitals. Machines keep people alive when in reality, they would be long dead. If that is what they want, that they fight for every breath, fine. If they are begging to be let go, it is extremely cruel and cowardly, to refuse them. No one sane takes pleasure in killing, but as every vet will tell you, when it is time, when there is no more to be done, and suffering will simply increase. To not help, would, I am sure, haunt doctors FAR MORE. I must say, I am not in the health system. but have lost family, who declared loudly and repeatedly, if I am bedridden, if I am a helpless, undignified mess, tell every doctor, no feeding, no drawn out life. Lots of painkiller and keep upping the dose. Luckily, my mother dropped dead in a chemist's shop. I know she would have been pleased with that, tho FURIOUS she had just spent a packet on dental care. Similarly, tho I am left wing/intellectual/compassionate in leaning, there are cases where particularly sick murderers, in clear cases, I think could well be PTS, not as punishment, but as you would PTS a rabied dog. Like that Finnish?chap. He will cost a fortune to keep in isolation, his health, his guards. That same money would save the lives/improve the lives of kindly, loved and loving people who can't afford private health care. Every year, more people could have had the help they needed, to live or to return to mainstream life. He killed so many, he's identified, the case is open/shut, he admits it, and he is quite happy to die. That money could be used, for decades of his potential life, saving/helping people suffering/dying now. Or spend it on saving an endangered species.

PARSLEY. I favour flat leafed, aka Italian/Continental, and CHIVES can perk things up. I guess you need CLASSIC MINT, use in mint sauce, if you eat meat, or for adding to salads, drinks - one unusual but nice SIDE salad, is diced beetroot, sour cream and common mint. Sounds erk, but is really nice. You could get other mints, but you may have to grow apart. Remember they tend to take over, if happy, so grow in a pot. If tight space, you can put the pot in middle of round/square bed as focal point, and keep trimming it, so hanging pieces don't get the chance to take root. I also LOVE coriander, I think called CILANTRO, in the U S. NASTURTIUMS, look pretty, can put flowers and leaves in salads, (peppery taste). I'd put in some ruffled mixed colour, LETTUCE, in any gaps. Look pretty, and always useful, cost more to buy, and growing, you can just take outer leaves, and grow/use them longer.. GARLIC, easy. Or, if garlic is a bit strong, try GARLIC CHIVES. Much milder, a flatter leaf, than normal chives. You could also get a BAY TREE, keep in large pot, keep trimming, to keep small. Just pluck a leaf ot 2, if doing a casserole. What climate? Do youhave pets?

http://www.care2.com/causes/nc-ignores-science-tries-to-make-sea-level-rise-illegal.html

http://www.wired.com/magazine/2012/02/ff_jerusalemsyndrome/all/1

If I was buying, I'd be more interested in nonfiction, as a fundraiser Everyone telling their favorite, science linked stories of discoveries, observations, etc. Great to inspire teens with a science interest. Great for Xmas presents, if they lean that way.

Would that occur high enough to make that much difference? I'm told that they also cause deaths from air pressure changes, rather than being hit by a blade, so would this mean dying bats and birds occasionally hitting windscreens? I put my hand up to not knowing, just being told, I think on QI, but then QI can be wrong, regularly enough to still have to check.

http://www.care2.com/causes/the-u-s-is-spending-your-money-killing-innocent-wildlife.html If you are American, look into what is happening to wolves in America, in particular. Even newly introduced foundation stock, still wearing tracker collars, shot, pregnant, or set upon by dogs for entertainment

I did view, but I don't really like sci fi, unless funny. Douglas Adams, Tom Holt, etc. Felt I had to explain why I felt I couldn't contribute or answer. Read mainly non fiction. Tom Holt started one story with the main character finding himself sitting next to a dead fighter pilot, in the fighter, during WW2, I THINK I recall. I think I read it over a decade ago. I liked that start. Quirky

sorry if I put it in the wrong spot. Just thought it interesting, and as an atheist, supporter of gay equality with straight people, I would like to know if someone was spending profits in a way that would upset me. I almost never buy takeaway, once in 3 or 4 years? Had never thought about it, and just thought others would like to know. Left it as neutral as possible, in initial entry. Some may favour these businesses. I just think we should know. In Oz, I only recognise one name, but I'd like to know about the obsessions of a lot of these major businesses' owners.

http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-07-25/which-fast-food-chain-is-the-most-religious

Thanks for the extra info. It's nice to be able to share chance finds like this. I gather it does? Makes me feel a meeting of the personality of the researcher. A sense of humour, and a heads up, for anyone thinking of taking it further... like them

http://mentalfloss.com/article/30380/why-some-civil-war-soldiers-glowed-dark

I can't read the last link, is it? The NY Time join forces xml I have to say, from an outsiders viewpoint, I CANNOT comprehend the aggressive championing of the poor and battling middle classes' rightwing voters to vote to ENABLE and encourage the INSANELY WEALTHY to completely rip them off, by voting in people who have no real interest but to get their multimillionaire/billionaire buddies domination of the pig trough. Even as, to my horror, the rightwing and wealthy in Oz are desperate to follow, and great swathes of nobodies are again, aggressively fighting to let them. It's as tho 1/2 the world has decided to hold themselves up, take their own money, and then give it to Cheney, et al, and deny their children inheritance, tertiary education and healthcare. I understand those MAKING the money grabbing without guilt, without a moment's compunction, twisting laws, escaping paying a FAIR tax, but it's like watching average people fight for the right to self harm. All voting to encourage MORE self damage to their country and their own family and themselves. I am, in the depressing reality of what is happening, truly surprised and a little encouraged to read a few republicans are actually realising what is happening.

Please sign and ask your contacts to sign and pass on, OR. if you don't agree, shout me a mobile phone, pay an unlimited talk time and I'll put my chooks on speaker phone... This thread title is not going to be debated by me. https://yourclimatechange.org/

SOCIALISM You have 2 cows. You give one to your neighbour. COMMUNISM You have 2 cows. The State takes both and gives you some milk. FASCISM You have 2 cows. The State takes both and sells you some milk. NAZISM You have 2 cows. The State takes both and shoots you. BUREAUCRATISM You have 2 cows. The State takes both, shoots one, milks the other, and then throws the milk away... TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income. AN AMERICAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows. Later, you hire a consultant to analyze why the cow has dropped dead. ENRON VENTURE CAPITALISM You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listedcompany. The annual report says the company owns eight cows,with an option on one more. You sell one cow to buy a new president of the United States , leaving you with nine cows. No balance sheet provided with the release. The public then buys your bull. A FRENCH CORPORATION You have two cows. You go on strike, organise a riot, and block the roads, because you want three cows. A JAPANESE CORPORATION You have two cows. You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk. You then create a clever cow cartoon image called 'Cowkimon' and market it worldwide. A GERMAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You re-engineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month, and milk themselves. AN ITALIAN CORPORATION You have two cows, but you don't know where they are. You decide to have lunch. A RUSSIAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You count them and learn you have five cows. You count them again and learn you have 42 cows. You count them again and learn you have 2 cows. You stop counting cows and open another bottle of vodka. A SWISS CORPORATION You have 5000 cows. None of them belong to you. You charge the owners for storing them. A CHINESE CORPORATION You have two cows. You have 300 people milking them. You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine productivity. You arrest the newsman who reported the real situation. AN INDIAN CORPORATION You have two cows. You worship them. A BRITISH CORPORATION You have two cows. Both are mad. AN IRAQI CORPORATION Everyone thinks you have lots of cows. You tell them that you have none. No-one believes you, so they bomb you and invade your country. You still have no cows, but at least now you are part of Democracy... AN AUSTRALIAN COMPANY You have 2 cows It's a nice day, you go to the pub. A NEW ZEALAND COMPANY You have 2 cows One has the same beautiful eyes as your favorite ewe SURREALISM You have two giraffes. The government requires you to take harmonica lessons NB Not my work, no idea whose, been around for a decade, I think.

I'd just like to say I am sad that you have had a traumatic experience. There are some very kind and compassionate people on this site, and perhaps they can advise you how to approach doctors, to understand what you do and don't need, and the information to make those decisions. If you are feeling alone and cornered, you need to find some good medics and social workers, who will go with you, explain your fears, and discuss what the problems on both sides, might be. Many people have parents they realise they can't rely on, whatever their class. Sad fact is, many parents are walking wounded from their own life experiences, it is rare that a parent sets out to damage their child, they just get things wrong, don't understand, or become scared, or are so damaged themselves, they can't fix their behaviour. We just have to learn to block hurts, even if we have to move away. It does sound as tho you need them for now. Have you gently asked what they are fearing from your behaviour? Maybe you don't realise what you do, that has them react so badly? Don't see this as a blame game conversation, but an information gathering exercise. Neither side accusing, just explaining. Find a service that does have lovely, kindly social workers that can go with you, discuss things calmly, be a supporter to you. At some point, tho, if everyone really, earnestly believes you need help, you have to trust them. Often, we don't understand our effect on others. As I said, if you have great worries about certain medication, get your supporter to make sure it is understood, and you get something to lessen the symptoms you fear. It seems that a lot of your distress is feeling you aren't being listened to, and no one has your back. Yet you must understand, that sometimes, those feelings are caused by your illness. As well. you are 21, your parents are happy to share their home with you, in need, but are you showing the appreciation of their kindness? Are you taking illicit drugs, are you acting in a frightening way, at home, while on these drugs or withdrawing from them? How do you know, if you are taking drugs from a drugs lab in some filthy kitchen or factory, that those drugs don't cause your health problems? You can't know what cr#p is in illegal drugs. I'm not presuming anything, just giving you things to think about. It seems a bit disengenuous to screech about regulated drugs effects, IF you then take illegal drug lab stuff, which is known to be full of rubbish, often toxic, and capable of destroying brains and killing.. Please remember that every medic, every social worker, is an individual. There are some a*ses, they are only human beings, no better than anyone alse, but well educated. BUT there are also unbelievably good, kind people who genuinely care so much for people. One of the kindest, wisest, best people I know, is an English nurse. She suffered from depression herself, and was medicated. She is truly special, and has 4 huskies/mals, very much a handful, my idea of dog hell. I have gentle dogs, who live with sheep, hens, cats, won't hurt anything, from stick insect to snake. Had a very venomous snake in my kitchen, and if they'd tried to attack, they'd be dead, but they don't hassle anything, because everything living is apparently Mum's (me) best friend. So they ignored it, and I chased it out. Sorry I digressed, but that nurse even takes on really demanding dogs on her time off! Then, medication. There are often ranges in strength, different ways of achieving goals.Medications to lessen effects. Lots of people function on meds, but have to faff about to get things right, long term. Take your trusted social worker, try tiny doses, build up. AND be fair, if you take illicit drugs, that can vary from each batch, you can't blame the hospital drugs for symptoms.

I can't see it happening. The best you could aim for is to feed in all opinions, public utterances. Even if you could get a computer to have the same opinions, it would never have new experiences, never develop as Lennon or anyone would have, because no one knows what would have effected his life and thoughts. His views on everything cannot be known, the experiences that effected him that he never discussed can never be known, but I cannot see why the abstract fantasy of gods have to come into the question. To me, I can't imagine such a thing as anything but a very quickly boring Tussauds type entertainment. If you are envisaging some sort ability to compute a living brains personality and knowledge, before or after death, I think there are far more practical problems and future possibilities more attainable. Why Jonn Lennon, anyway? Why not Alan Turing, if you are aiming for a lost intelligence.

ringer, I don't understand the odd access, but that link? is it called? was brilliant. (reply #41) I wish every poor right wing voter could just comprehend what they are doing to themselves, how they are manipulated to lose more and more. It shocked me, and I KNEW it was atrocious. I was reading, "Actually Mr Brill, fixing health care is kinda simple," tho while he opts for med insurance through his state, it is just common sense to do it through the national government.

excuse me, WHO is praising China? China and Russia are examples of why communism will always fail, unless the population is controlled. This squealing reaction to criticism and the thrusting of a non democratic and extremist government as an answer to being confronted with fact, really does nothing to impress those with even a small comprehension of economics, politics OR world history, but I guess that passes for Republican debate. We are talking democratic, flourishing countries. The bulk of their citizens doing far better than MILLIONS of Americans, their healthcare guaranteed, their elderly living in dignity, whilst, in the Land of the Free To Be Greedy and Ignorant, the poor old, disabled, disturbed, are seen as as inconvenient trash, by the right wing. With that attitude to fellow citizens, no wonder your native wildlife is in so much trouble. It so saddens me that so many truly caring, compassionate, decent average Americans volunteer, sacrifice so much, when their own country could so easily provide so much protection to it's disabled, elderly and sick, just from a FAIR tax system. Many of these unthinkingly greedy ultra rich are screaming how a fair tax rate would gouge them. So they don't have 5, 10, 20 imported luxury cars - how obscene is that, when people are dying, waiting for or unable to afford a simple operation. So they don't have 3 houses in America, and an island or 3 houses overseas. Poor diddums. If you have billions. even millions, and cannot, in 10 generations, spend what you have, when your spending is obscene, then scream with outrage at being expected to pay as much tax, percentage wise, as a wage earner on $40000... If you can't see that as obscene, as morally bankrupt, I can only suggest that if your health fails, your parents wealth is lost overnught with a carpet bagger investment scheme, and you need a heart operation, and you have a disabled child needing 24 hour care and many hospital visits, I hope you realise how different your life would be, how much more CIVILISED that life is... Most people don't need that help for decades, some never, but are happy, and would fight for those less fortunate to have that automatic protection. EXCEPT Republicans, apparently... So why answer me with the irrational example of China? Is that the sum total of your knowledge of the politics and economics of the rest of the world? One thing we can thank China for, despite the uneducated horror of aborting female babies, is the one child policy. Would that that came in, worldwide, for the next 100 years.

<p>If you go back to your fantasy of the European poor coming with nothing, and flourishing, such as the Irish, the eastern Europeans of early 20th century, you might like to look at the death rates of men, women and children, that conveniently AREN'T part of your fantasy rewriting of history. Those who survived, in many cases, were hustlers, ready to do whatever it takes to become well off. Others were helped by extended families, the young adult sons sent out to try to establish a foothold before the arrival of families. They lived in tenements crawling with lice, fleas, disease, no lavatories, or bathrooms, kitchens fire hazards used by all, and infecting all. Families living in 1 room, little furniture, no heating. Bring back the Good Old Days, eh? (Ooh look, they're almost here...) </p> <p> </p> <p> Disabled children left to fester in rooms, with no hope of a glimmer of the most basic happiness, usually until they died young. Small children caring for babies, disabled chldren, child molestation so unilportant, it was rarely bothered to report it. Yes, some families flourished, but the price was paid with appalling child mortality rates, many women dying very young, many men dying very young... but hey, that's the realities of the Republican economics, eh? You celebrate and recommend a return to that?</p> <p> </p> <p> A number of families got ahead by pickpocketing, scams, screwing those other unfortunates living near them, selling their wives and daughters, to feed the younger children. What fantasy of the Good Old Days are you volunteering for? As an American, you have no problem with knowing that sort of life is being lived, by your own citizens? That that is what you would walk by, with no sense of horror, no sense of compassion? You would allow a 3 year old to starve in the street and die, as they did in the early 20th century, because there was no social security.</p> <p> </p> <p>If you move to a new state, you leave behind family/the only adults you know and hopefully can trust to mind your kids, if there is an emergency or while you work. You may own a car, but you might be living in it. Is there a guarantee of a job in this other state? They won't be earning enough for a professional babysitter. With your empathy, they leave kids in the car while they work? I feel really badly for the educated, compassionate, gentle Americans who understand Keynes, and know the unspoken horrors of Heyek economics, and live with the knowledge of how Americans and their social welfare systems work in reality, and how they are viewed, as a whole, by much of the world...</p> <p> </p> <p>If the comfortably off/wealthy rightwing actually studied history, you'd know your economic theories led to the French Revolution, the Russian Revolution. Much of the angry unrest and violent TAKING of your wealth, is due to the anger of seeing the vacuous, the trust babies, with IQs struggling to make 70, in jobs in which they are incapable - prime example, W, who really should have got a job feeding pigs. Look at the state of America thanks to him and the men who ran and manipulated him. The thuggish, uneducated poor have access to tvs and see how thuggish, stupid wealthy live, They can see they are just as thick, just as thoughtlessly greedy, and are reacting as they would in the school yard, except with high powered guns bought at the local shops,, because of America's insane gun laws.</p> <p> </p> <p>The most stable AND HAPPY societies are those where equality within society, is well established, some where top wages can only be a maximum of 20 times the average wage. Usually, great education, health care for all, and care for the disabled and old. No one fears that if they get cancer, need a hip replaced, etc, that they'll lose their home. Society values you, has got your back... An idea that is incomprehensible to probably half of America, a fact taken for granted, in so many first world countries. If that system of wage limit was brought in to America, America would have universal healthcare, free education, including tertiary, a mental and physical disability system that would give everybody the chance to achieve at their highest level, allow their carers a personal life, an ability to work, even study, in order to work shorter hours to support their family member.</p> <p> </p> <p>I am always amazed at the boasting about America being the greatest. It COULD be, but the reality for many in your country is the same as the worst conditions in Eastern Europe, THAT is your America, just as the ethical horror of a Karcrapion being valued as a star, paid obscene amounts of money, a values system that sinks like a stone, and an @rse that would look better on a horse, means if they get pregnant, it makes NEWS. The vacuous greed, the value of vulgar trash, the ignorance, the lack of compassion of the majority of those supporting one of your parties just SHOCKS so much of the world. </p>

I cannot comprehend the American bloodlust attacks on the poor to impoverished, when the obscenity of what your wealthy get away with seems to be given the big thumbs up. Your working poor and lower middle classes pay far more tax than your wealthy, speaking percentages. Give money to the working or pensioner poor, and it is all spent on necessities and basic comforts, locally. Tax the wealthy less, the money is spent overseas, on jewellery, on a 6th car, the 3rd home, on excessive and vulgar clothing... Those homes often stand empty, much of the year, the conspicuous waste, the sense of entitled excess, whilst often that money is made screwing hardworking, underpaid, working poor, not paid an income they can live on, and depending on a forced tipping system to pay for the most basic, desperate inescapable lives, that the rest of the world finds bizarre. The trickle down effect is one of the most clearly untrue and pathetic claims, and that isn't challenged, at all. Most bizarre of all, is many of those most badly effected seem to believe it, cling to a fantasy that one day,they might somehow get to be wealthy and live lives of ourtrageous, undeserved wealth. I can't fathom how the poor can be so ignorant of the way they are being screwed. They could completely shake up the system, if they actually bothered to vote and spent some time having economic reality explained in words of one syllable. Again, there is a large percentage of wealthy to comfortable middle class, in America, usually all voting for one party, that still seem to believe wealth and good fortune is in the hands of whether God cares for them, personally, so that, altho unsaid, the poor clearly deserve it, or God would have protected them. The same attitude comes from the bleated remark in major disasters, that God clearly has a special role for me, to spare me. The same attitude was rampant in primitive middle ages Europe. The ugly, crippled, the poor are there because God believes they deserve it. The fact that the fortunate often come from already wealthy families, or have parents who are related to, or friends of someone wealthy, who gave them a foothold to a well paid, OVERPAID job, is conveniently forgotten. Or they walk into family businesses or come from a family that managed to get a free education from WW2 service and from that point, became a family that can pay forward a good tertiary education for each generation. Always the attitude that I DESERVE this, the guy next to me doesn't, rife through the supporters of one party. What boggles my mind most, is so often that attitude comes with proud claims of religious belief, but EVERYTHING Jesus seemed to preach, is classic, textbook socialism. But hey, since when did the majority of christians live even remotely, the life of Jesus they memorise and claim as their ideal?