Thursday, 5th March, 2009
Personal Responsibility
I've been hearing about personal responsibility a lot lately. In particular, there seems to be a general argument coming from the Republican side that Democrats want to eliminate personal responsibility in this country. I'd like to set the record straight on this issue, because I think this is yet another example of one side not understanding where the other is coming from.
Although there are no doubt a few exceptions among the extreme liberal members of the Democratic party, the vast majority of real progressives that make up the core of the party does NOT want to eliminate personal responsibility. We absolutely do believe that people should be held accountable for their choices, and that if they make a bad choice, they absolutely should not be absolved entirely of the consequences of that choice.
Where we disagree is on what role the government should play. In an extremely general sense, progressives believe that part of the government's job is to help protect the people from private industry taking advantage of their ignorance. A perfect example of this is the recent crash in the housing industry. While those who purchased mortgages that they really couldn't afford are certainly to be held accountable for their poor choice, the banks also bear a level of responsibility for offering those mortgages in the first place. Prior to the Bush administration, there was legislation in place to help regulate the types of mortgages that banks could offer. This provided a level of protection for consumers. However, after the deregulation of the banking industry, banks saw an opportunity to take advantage of homeowners eager to purchase more than they could afford with no risk to the bank - after all, if they ended up defaulting on the mortgage, the property would just go back to the bank. Home prices soared to all-time highs while this was going on, resulting it people who are responsible being able to afford less than before. And then, after the plan backfired, everyone (responsible or not) is being affected due to the drain it is placing on the economy). Now if the world was perfect, those banks would be forced out of business, people would find other places to live, and everything would recover. Unfortunately, it doesn't work that way, and instead we are ALL paying the price as a result.
In addition to helping protect the public, progressives also believe that one of the primary roles of the government is to help provide opportunities for us all to succeed. This does not mean that the government should absolve people of the consequences of their poor decisions, nor does it mean that the government should just take care of us all. But everyone makes mistakes from time to time, and we should not allow people to fail simply for making a bad choice. What's more, many people simply don't have good opportunities to begin with due to some social constraint. For example, after graduating high school, my family couldn't afford to send me to college. Thankfully, the government had instituted the HOPE scholarship program that allowed me to attend Georgia Tech. Without that program, I would have had two choices - either try to acquire costly student loans to pay for college, or don't go. Most likely I would have gone the student loans route, but then I would be paying hundreds of dollars a month for many years in order to repay those loans. Instead, I'm able to invest that money into our economy.
Let me just reiterate here. Progressives do not want personal responsibility eliminated. We do no want the government to simply take care of us. We are not looking for handouts. We are, however, looking to the government to provide some protection against irresponsible business practices. We are looking to the government to help provide opportunities for those who have made some mistakes in the past, as well as those who just wouldn't have those opportunities otherwise. Capitalism may be a great thing, but capitalism run unchecked can also be very dangerous and risky.
Thursday, 12th March, 2009
Stopping Messing With American Idol!
Seriously! First they decided that they weren't going to show as many bad singers in the first round. I personally think that was a stupid move - I mean people like to see people make a fool of themselves on national television, for better or for worse it's part of the entertainment - but I can somewhat see their point. Then they completely changed the format of the top 36. While I do like the fact that it's no longer constrained by a sense of gender equality, they've traded one unfairness for another. What happens if one of the sets of 12 contains a plethora of strong singers (like week 3 of this year)? It just doesn't make much sense.
But this last change is just too much. I totally respect the judges (well except for Paula, she's a freak), but the whole point of the top 12 in American Idol is that America gets to decide. By giving the judges a chance to overrule what America has voted, they're minimizing the importance of voting. Now I totally understand their reasoning - believe me, I was so upset with Daughtry being voted off that I almost didn't watch the rest of the season - but it still doesn't make sense. First of all, the rules for this new overrule specifically state that it's only in effect until the top 5. Daughtry made it to the top 4, so this change wouldn't even have helped him. Second, Daughtry is doing better than most of the American Idol winners are doing; arguably his career is in a better place because he didn't win, because it allowed him to do what he wants to do without being constrained by the American Idol contract. Or take Jennifer Hudson, one of the other people they mentioned. She's doing just fine with her career, despite not winning. And even if the judges had "saved her", even Simon Cowell wouldn't have given her a chance in hell against Fantasia. In other words, if these people are as good as advertised, they will still do well in the industry even if they don't win, and depending on the artist, they might even do better!
My personal opinion? They made this rule change because of bad publicity. There are at least three cases of non-winners doing better than the ones who ended up winning that year (Clay Aiken, Jennifer Hudson, and Chris Daughtry). They made this change so that they can try to improve the odds that their winner really is the best one in the competition, the one that ends up being the most successful.
Anyway, enough of my rant. As an aside, what the heck was up with Kelly Clarkson? Her song was just terrible, she looked awful, she sounded awful... I don't know, something was definitely up with her.