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Thread: Trump Administration Destroys US Department of Agriculture, Conservatives Rejoice

  1. #31
    If you have large amounts of agricultural research occurring in a high-cost area far away from agricultural centers, you might be doing it wrong.
    Impossible to determine the usefulness of this statement without knowing more about the work they do and who they are. Obviously your sage grandfatherly musings aren't very useful here.
    Last edited by Aimless; 08-07-2019 at 11:25 PM.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  2. #32
    Exactly. Yet we're expected to just go on the word of an inveterately change-resistant government union that this is an anti-science crusade and not a mostly-sensible cost cutting exercise?

  3. #33
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    Exactly. Yet we're expected to just go on the word of an inveterately change-resistant government union that this is an anti-science crusade and not a mostly-sensible cost cutting exercise?
    Presumably the organization representing the people who work in these fields can be expected to know at least as much as the notoriously incompetent and notoriously anti-science derpheads that have been placed in charge of govt institutions since Trump's ascension to the throne.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  4. #34
    "In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."

  5. #35
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    If you have large amounts of agricultural research occurring in a high-cost area far away from agricultural centers, you might be doing it wrong.

    It's also worth noting that the DC area never had a recession or property value declines during the global financial crisis. If a single employer has enough power to create a housing boom, that employer should consider whether costs could be saved by distributing its workforce. Every organization does this. The exercise is not in itself some kind of anti-science Jihad.
    Do you have any idea how research works? I don't go to a freaking war zone to study war. A vast majority of research involves going through the literature, gathering data, and doing stats. Some might require experiments, but the scientists are probably not the ones on the ground doing the day-to-day grunt work. There are economists who are simultaneously running experiments in Africa and Asia, all while working in the US.

    Every organization does this...that's why there are so many high-salary firms in a handful of American cities.

    I also find it ironic that in the same thread where wig defends 8 digit executive salaries as an inducement to work harder/better, you begrudge scientists a good work site for the same reason. You do know that we have a free market, right? People with Ph.Ds. in STEM fields can easily get higher salaries elsewhere, and that elsewhere is presumably better than Kansas. Not that you care. You'd be happy with the government hiring the worst available workers just so you could convince yourself that the government indeed sucks.
    Last edited by Loki; 08-08-2019 at 04:07 AM.
    Hope is the denial of reality

  6. #36
    Quote Originally Posted by Dreadnaught View Post
    Exactly. Yet we're expected to just go on the word of an inveterately change-resistant government union that this is an anti-science crusade and not a mostly-sensible cost cutting exercise?
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post


    Trump's administration only likes things that support their ideology. They've buried, ignored, denied, or obfuscated facts that don't match their political agenda. They've done it with other federal agencies too, so it's clearly a pattern where the ends justify the means, which is pretty much the definition of "anti-science".


  7. #37
    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    You mean this was an attempt to reduce the federal workforce? And you think I'd have an objection to that? Until federal employees have similar turnover numbers as the private sector I'm not going to shed any tears.

  8. #38
    If you *really* want to reduce federal workforce spending, why not start with the 40% that is military-related?

    It doesn't make sense to strip research agencies in the short-term -- that could reduce the need for military in the long-term. Your police-state bias is showing.


  9. #39
    Quote Originally Posted by GGT View Post
    If you *really* want to reduce federal workforce spending, why not start with the 40% that is military-related?

    It doesn't make sense to strip research agencies in the short-term -- that could reduce the need for military in the long-term. Your police-state bias is showing.

    The primary purpose of the state is to protect the citizens from external (enemy nations invading) and internal (crime) threats. Beyond those core purposes I want the government to have very limited power and scope.

  10. #40
    This is why you cheerlead for Trump every time he tries to do the opposite. No one buys this BS anymore, Lewk.
    Hope is the denial of reality

  11. #41
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    This is why you cheerlead for Trump every time he tries to do the opposite.
    Wait till you see how he starts celebrating after Trump issues an executive order telling private businesses to start protecting hate speech.
    "In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."

  12. #42
    Let sleeping tigers lie Khendraja'aro's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ominous Gamer View Post
    Wait till you see how he starts celebrating after Trump issues an executive order telling private businesses to start protecting hate speech.
    It's funny how it's okay for cake producers to ban gays but when it's YouTube banning Nazis then it's suddenly an assault on freeze peach.
    When the stars threw down their spears
    And watered heaven with their tears:
    Did he smile his work to see?
    Did he who made the lamb make thee?

  13. #43
    Trump's administration is also gutting the EPA. And the Endangered Species Act. Too many regulations, too much governmental control. Let the private corporations make decisions that impact the whole nation for future generations -- they know better than any science or research that comes from "the government".

  14. #44
    Quote Originally Posted by Khendraja'aro View Post
    It's funny how it's okay for cake producers to ban gays but when it's YouTube banning Nazis then it's suddenly an assault on freeze peach.
    The bakery never banned gays. Go read through the case.

  15. #45
    Quote Originally Posted by Lewkowski View Post
    The primary purpose of the state is to protect the citizens from external (enemy nations invading) and internal (crime) threats. Beyond those core purposes I want the government to have very limited power and scope.
    But you also expect individual and religious freedoms will be protected as a constitutional mandate. So stop pretending that you want a small/limited federal government.

  16. #46
    Warning: op-ed may trigger bureaucrats.

    https://www.wsj.com/articles/move-th...ay-11575063150

    Move the Bureaucrats Out of the Beltway
    It no longer makes sense to cluster federal agencies and their employees in Washington, D.C.

    “You know, farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you’re a thousand miles from the corn field,” said President Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1956. That pretty much describes the Agriculture Department bureaucracy in Washington, D.C. Although the big building on Independence Avenue is full of smart and well-meaning people, there’s no getting around the fact that they’re far removed from the regular business of farming.

    It doesn’t have to be that way—at least not according to a couple of Republican senators, Josh Hawley of Missouri and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee. They’ve proposed moving the Agriculture Department and nine other federal agencies outside D.C. and into the heart of America.

    It’s a thought-provoking idea reminiscent of what agronomist Norman Borlaug, the father of the Green Revolution, said on his deathbed: “Take it to the farmer.” What he meant was, if we seek excellence in food security, everyone in the food business must collaborate with the men and women who work the land. That’s what Borlaug did as a scientist. He developed new crop strains, boosting food production so much in the 1950s and 1960s that he received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970.

    Today, “taking it to the farmer” involves not just the scientists who innovate but also the Beltway regulators whose rules and mandates affect what happens to those who work the land a thousand miles—or more—away. The Hawley-Blackburn bill calls for moving Agriculture and its more than 100,000 employees to Missouri. Other departments would go elsewhere: Commerce to Pennsylvania, Education to Tennessee, Energy to Kentucky, Health and Human Services to Indiana, Housing and Urban Development to Ohio, Interior to New Mexico, Labor to West Virginia, Transportation to Michigan, and Veterans Affairs to South Carolina.

    They wouldn’t relocate to just anywhere within these states, but rather to economically depressed regions. The bill’s sponsors pitch their legislation as an employment program. They call it the HIRE Act, which stands for “Helping Infrastructure Restore the Economy.”

    That’s fine, but the main benefit would come from putting regulators into proximity with the people whose lives and businesses they regulate. It makes sense for Agriculture to have its headquarters in a big farm state such as Missouri, and it also makes sense to move Interior to New Mexico, where it will be closer to the Western lands that occupy so much of its time.

    Under this plan, federal regulators would gain firsthand knowledge of what the policies they adopt and enforce do to real people. In the future, maybe an official at Agriculture will actually be able to live on a farm. A bureaucrat at Interior will be married to a rancher, and a deputy assistant secretary at Transportation will have a brother who works on an automotive assembly line.

    This would be a government “of the people”—something that is lacking as the administrative state inexorably grows in Washington, D.C.

    Before the advent of air travel and telecommunications, it made sense to cluster federal agencies in Washington. In the 21st century, however, technology enables us to do so much more—and to take advantage of a truly federal system, which seeks to disperse the power of government.


    The Trump administration appears to understand the principle: The headquarters of the Bureau of Land Management soon will move to Grand Junction, Colo., and 547 employees of the Agriculture Department’s Economic Research Service and the National Institute of Food and Agriculture will shift to Kansas City, Mo.

    The Hawley-Blackburn bill could attract bipartisan support. Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang also has proposed moving agencies out of Washington. Several liberal-leaning think tanks and journalists have expressed support for the concept.

    “The proper role of government” is “that of partner with the farmer—never his master,” said President Eisenhower. Let’s seize a chance to take it to the farmer, as well as everybody else who has a stake in the decisions that we ought to make closer to the people.

    Mr. Wanzek grows wheat, corn, soybeans and pinto beans on a family farm in Jamestown, N.D. He represents the 29th district in the state Senate and is a member of the Global Farmer Network.

  17. #47
    The whole point of this policy is to trigger bureaucrats. It has no advantages. But for the kind of person who wants to destroy government so their clients can engage in negative externalities without consequence, I see why it would have appeal.
    Hope is the denial of reality

  18. #48
    *shrug* WSJ Opinion is basically Fox & Friends for people who think they're rich.
    "One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."

  19. #49

  20. #50
    Quote Originally Posted by Loki View Post
    the kind of person who wants to destroy government so their clients can engage in negative externalities without consequence,
    This is about the best summery of the modern conservative movement I've seen.
    When the sky above us fell
    We descended into hell
    Into kingdom come

  21. #51
    "The bill’s sponsors pitch their legislation as an employment program." A job's program for bureaucrats?

    It's hard to take conservatives seriously when they don't protest Trump's Tariffs. Just sayin'.

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